


Weep, Little Lion Man

by orphan_account



Category: American Gods - Neil Gaiman, Supernatural
Genre: Crossover, F/M, Gen, Supernatural Crossover Big Bang Challenge
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-05-22
Updated: 2010-05-22
Packaged: 2017-11-27 10:41:15
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 29,935
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/661043
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Castiel's search for God incorporates several more Gods than he had anticipated.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Weep, Little Lion Man

**Author's Note:**

> This was originally written for the 2010 Supernatural Crossover Big Bang Challenge and, as such, has been Jossed to hell and back since then. It's probably best if you consider it mostly AU for Supernatural from mid-S5. Kindly betaed by [delgaserasca](http://tja-rama.livejournal.com/), without whom I would be uploading the version where I spelt several of the characters' names wrong. Special shout-out to [cs_whitewolf](http://archiveofourown.org/users/CS_WhiteWolf/pseuds/CS_WhiteWolf) for holding my hand through baby's first Big Bang challenge. Dedicated post-publication to [Lass](http://archiveofourown.org/users/Lassiter), because of reasons.

Dean Winchester had a saying he was particularly fond of using, usually when Sam expressed exasperation at Dean’s love for physical destruction: ‘ _Can’t make an omelette without breaking a few eggs, Sammy_.’ Castiel was no stranger to the idea of the ends justifying the means, but the phrase struck him with its frivolity, the way it sapped the undesirable element from reality, its ability to make you believe you were doing more important or terrible than cooking a simple breakfast.  
  
He had this idiom firmly in mind as he stood in front of the red-painted door.  
  
The hallway was full of the ghostly scents of meals long since cooked and consumed, and the evidence of at least one cat. As he stood there, Castiel could hear the sounds of the other tenants in their apartments, close and claustrophobic. The people in the room above were shouting, and Castiel knew it was in anger; the woman had just become pregnant for the second time, and her husband wasn’t happy about it. They lived on meagre means, and they didn’t have the money for another child, nor did they have the space for a fourth person, even a small one. The man was unhappy in his job, emasculated by his pitiful salary, and his wife’s pregnancy was reminding him of it.  
  
Behind the door, he heard a voice call: “One moment!” A clatter, a rattle, and then the door opened enough for an eye to peer out at him. It did a slow, mistrustful sweep of his entire body before fixing on his face. The voice asked: “Yes?”  
  
“I’m here to see Czernobog.”  
  
He didn’t phrase it as a question, but the woman obviously took it as such. “Nobody here with that name,” she told him, sounding irritated. “You must have wrong address.”  
  
The door began to swing shut, but Castiel caught it with a palm before it could fully close.  
  
“Ten minutes,” he told the gap. “To talk. Nothing more.”  
  
“This is what they all say, ‘to talk’,” the woman said, with clear contempt.  
  
“You have my word.”  
  
“And I am supposed to want this, your word?” She made a noise of disgust. “ _Pfeh_. You are all the same.”  
  
“They were trickster gods,” Castiel pointed out. “I’m not.”  
  
“All the same,” the woman repeated. “Bad news, just like them.”  
  
But she sounded less angry at him now, and for a moment they stood there watching each other: the woman behind the safety of the blood-red door, and Castiel waiting patiently in the hall. Castiel could feel the seconds ticking past him, like particles of silt being swept past on a long, straight river. He tried to remain calm, but the sense of urgency that he had been able to outrun on his way here had returned, and he found himself wishing he could just demand entry. It would be easy to force the door open, and he could already tell that the body behind it would yield as easily as a mortal’s, for Zorya Vechernyaya’s dominion over this day was ending.  
  
Castiel had walked through the gates of Perdition in search of Dean’s soul, laying to waste any demon who stood in his way, and it seemed sordid that he could be held back now by something as inconsequential as an inch and a half of painted wood.  
  
“Ten minutes,” Zorya Vechernyaya said, surprising him. The door opened and a grey cat shot through the gap and disappeared down the hall, but Castiel ignored it, devoting his attention instead to the Zorya who had appeared in the doorway. She made a noise of displeasure and looked Castiel up and down with both eyes, set like dark, glittering jewels into the folds of her wrinkled face.  
  
She looked… older than he had expected. For a moment Castiel could see two separate women standing in front of him: one of them a wizened old crone, gaunt and unkempt in the way that old people often become in disuse, the other young and very beautiful, her golden hair falling around her face as softly as dusk falls across the land. Both women had a large amber ring on the middle finger of their right hand, and it shone as brightly as the sun. But when Castiel looked at her through his vessel’s eyes, Zorya Vechernyaya was simply a tired old woman in a shabby housecoat, glaring at him mulishly.  
  
“Well?” she demanded. “You want in? Or you want to stand out there?”  
  
The gloomy hallway was so narrow that Castiel had to squeeze between the Zorya and the wall in order to fit in, and naturally she didn’t make a move to help him. It occurred to him belatedly that he should have stopped the cat from leaving, but he wasn’t sure why, or why it suddenly seemed so important.  
  
“Come,” the Zorya said, and led Castiel down the hallway. The smell of old meals and cat litter was stronger in here, and Castiel held his breath as subtly as he could. Zorya Vechernyaya led him along the corridor, past several closed doors and then into a small sitting room, where she pointed at the sofa and said: “Sit. I will wake Czernobog, bring coffee.”  
  
“That won’t be necessary,” Castiel began, but Zorya Vechernyaya had already gone.  
  
Castiel glanced at the couch, but it was a filthy, formless affair, and he couldn’t see the point of sitting on something so clearly uncomfortable. Instead, he folded his hands behind his back and glanced around the room. As far as rooms went, it wasn’t much better than the motels that the Winchester brothers stayed in. The coffee table was covered in accumulated filth: cigarette burns, coffee cup rings, and a thin layer of soot and grit. In the middle of it all was a battered chess board and a fine, heavy glass ash tray. The bowl was black with tar, but the sides were only a little misty, and they refracted the evening light into a pattern of rainbows. The wallpaper was covered in a thin layer of nicotine sludge, and there was a dark gray patch on the ceiling that loomed like a storm cloud.  
  
From behind Castiel, there was a polite cough.  
  
He turned, but it was not Zorya Vechernyaya as he had expected; this woman was also old, but her hair was still fair. As it had been with Zorya Vechernyaya, Castiel could see two separate figures standing in the kitchen doorway: the old woman, as frail and insubstantial as a wisp of cotton, and the other a young woman, fair and fierce, armed as if for battle with dagger and arquebus. If Castiel had had thought that Zorya Vechernyaya was beautiful when he met her, then this woman outshone her as surely as the sun, and for a moment Castiel nearly buckled beneath the urge to sing his warrior’s praises to her, until Heaven and Earth trembled with the sound.  
  
The feeling passed like a bout of dizziness, leaving Castiel bewildered and unsettled. In the fading light the old woman simply looked pale and tired like any other mortal, and the wild desire that Castiel had felt for the young woman was already fading like a burn.  
  
“I am Zorya Utrennyaya,” she said. “I was asleep, but the evening is Zorya Vechernyaya’s time, and then it is Zorya Polunochnaya’s. It is not my time until tomorrow and I would not want to miss you. You must sit. I will help Zorya Vechernyaya bring the coffee through.”  
  
This time, Castiel sat. Instead of leaving, Zorya Utrennyaya stood in the doorway as if uncertain of her welcome and watched him unhappily for a moment or two.  
  
“Your future is not a happy one,” she finally said. “I tell fortunes, and my sisters say I am good because I lie, but there is no lie when I tell you this. You are a soldier, like me.” She stopped then, as if realizing that she had said too much.  
  
Ordinarily, Castiel would have dismissed her easily; he didn’t believe in fortune-telling, and certainly not from a lesser goddess, her powers diminished and her physical form a dried-up husk. But despite this, despite the domestic trappings of the murky living room – the ashtray on the table lit by the dying sun, the nicotine ring around the ceiling, Zorya Vechernyaya’s voice asking from the kitchen if he would like cream with his coffee – Castiel felt a shiver of foreboding, as if something huge and dangerous had just brushed past him in the darkness. Something content to leave him alone, but not for long. Something… waiting for him. _A touch of the Fates_ , as Zachariah was so fond of saying.  
  
Or, as Dean would put it: _Man, somebody just walked across my grave.  
_  
Zorya Vechernyaya took this moment to reappear, the tray in her hands laden with steaming cups of coffee. If she was surprised to see Zorya Utrennyaya standing in the door way, she didn’t show it beyond an offhanded, “You should be sleeping.” To Castiel, she handed his coffee and said: “Here. You drink. Czernobog will come.”  
  
Castiel sipped obediently. The coffee was strong, thick as tar, and very hot, but there was something pleasant about its sharp bitterness.  
  
“I will stay a while longer,” Zorya Utrennyaya said, her eyes fixed on Castiel.  
  
Zorya Vechernyaya shrugged. “You watch him, then,” she said, not unkindly. “I will start supper.” To Castiel she said: “I always cook supper. Zorya Utrennyaya can cook a little breakfast, but she is never awake in the afternoon, so her supper is not always good. Zorya Polunochnaya has no need to cook at all. We save food for her: we cannot afford it any other way.” Zorya Vechernyaya said the last part without any apparent shame, merely a kind of disinterest. “If you were to be here for supper, I would make you pay for it as I made Votan pay for his. But you will not be here for supper, so it doesn’t matter.”  
  
So saying, she turned and shuffled away on threadbare house slippers, leaving Castiel to puzzle over her words and the strange sense of Fate that accompanied them. Zorya Utrennyaya hovered uncertainly for a moment, as if she was considering leaving. Castiel found himself wishing that she would, as she was looking more and more ghostlike with every passing second.  
  
The thump of feet on the stairs announced Czernobog’s arrival.  
  
Once again, Castiel’s first glimpse of Czernobog was in double-vision. He saw the god that once was, the broad shoulders and wide hands, the dark hair, smooth and slick as oil, and the beard that grew on his square features like a thicket of wires. Then he saw the god that is, his sturdy body wasted and papery, his wild face lined as if with the marks of many battles. Czernobog’s hair was grey now, trimmed close to his skull except for a neat moustache, and he wore a dirty bathrobe and dirty pants, both bearing patterns that would have clashed if they hadn’t been faded almost to a ghost.  
  
The Czernobog that was was carrying a hammer with a wide, block-like head, the kind of hammer that could crack skulls in two like coconuts. It looked absurdly heavy when hefted by that short body, but Czernobog raised it as if it weighed nothing, slinging it against his shoulder like a soldier with a bayonet.  
  
Then he looked at Castiel, grinned his crooked grin, and winked.  
  
Castiel blinked in surprise and then there was only the Czernobog that is, cupping a cigarette to his mouth with hands like leathery snow-shovels, stained yellow at the tips. The light illuminated the bags of flesh hanging underneath his eyes, but his gaze was direct, as dark and keen as a crow’s. Castiel held it, a blade against his own, and was only vaguely aware of Zorya Utrennyaya’s presence in the doorway.  
  
Eventually, Czernobog spoke. “You should not have come here,” he said, his words illustrated in solemn grey smoke. “You bring the weight of Fate with you. But no matter.” He sat down in the armchair, which groaned and sagged slightly beneath him. “What do you want to know? Ten minutes; that was the agreement, yes?”  
  
“I’m looking for my Father,” Castiel said simply. “I think you know where he is.”  
  
That made Czernobog laugh, at least. “And I would know this, why? Because I am Old God?” He grinned, revealing one single, dark tooth amongst the yellow ones. “Your Father, vojak, he is more New than Old. You should ask Media. Technology, maybe.”  
  
“But I’m asking you,” Castiel said, before Czernobog could brush him off any further.  
  
Czernobog’s grin widened, giving Castiel the uncomfortable impression that he was being laughed at. But there was a taciturn approval in Czernobog’s voice when he said, “I like you. You have balls! You remind me of a man I once knew, and that is why I will tell you what you want to know. Ordinarily I would make you play checkers with me before I tell you, but…” he shrugged. “Another time, maybe.”  
  
“Maybe,” Castiel hedged. He had no intention of playing checkers with Czernobog, but he didn’t think it would be wise to say so. It wasn’t in Castiel’s nature to lie – or so he kept telling himself, which was in itself another lie into which the other ones slotted like nesting dolls – but he was very good at convincing himself of necessary evils.  
  
Dean had a saying for that, as well. _The road to Hell is paved with good intentions._  
  
Czernobog sucked on the filter of his cigarette for a moment, and then released it with a wet puffing sound. He glanced around before leaning in close, as if to impart some great secret, and Castiel found himself mirroring the position.  
  
“I have heard things,” Czernobog murmured. “Your Father is like us, sort of. He comes to this country on a boat, like us. He is almost Old God. So when he goes missing, we hear about it, yes?”  
  
This close, Castiel could smell the hot reek of Czernobog’s breath. He tried not to inhale too deeply. “And?”  
  
“There is a man called Shadow,” Czernobog said. “Find him, then maybe you find your answers.”  
  
Castiel sat back as if the strings tying him to Czernobog had been cut.  
  
“A man,” he said, flatly.  
  
“Not just any man,” said Czernobog. “You will see. And now, your time is up.”  
  
Right on cue, Zorya Utrennyaya stepped forward and snatched the half-empty mug from Castiel’s hands. “You must leave now,” she said, as she put the mug down on the table. “I am sorry. You cannot stay for supper.”  
  
Castiel looked to Czernobog for clemency, but the old man only stood slowly, straightening his joints with loud popping sounds and groaning deep in his chest like an old screen door.  
  
Zorya Utrennyaya grabbed Castiel by the sleeve of his coat and tugged him up with surprising strength. “Please,” she added. She flattened her hands into Castiel’s back and shoved, firmly, but he barely moved, unable to comprehend why he was being thrown out with such aggression.  
  
Then he felt it.  
  
Castiel’s awareness of his brothers was less than it used to be, and he knew with some level of bitterness that one could pass by him almost unnoticed, as Gabriel had done only a few weeks before. But now Castiel could feel the peculiar resonance of the presence of the Host, reaching him like vibrations down a wire. In that moment he realized that he had stumbled onto the edge of a vast spider’s web, and now what he could feel was the way the strands trembled as his brothers came for him.  
  
Zorya Vechernyaya appeared from the kitchen, wearing a greasy apron and her hair tied up in a loose knot at the back of her head. She was brandishing a wooden spoon as if it were a weapon. “Why is he still here?” she demanded of Czernobog and Zorya Utrennyaya, then of Castiel: “Go! They are no threat to us; you will lure them away when you leave. But if you stay, they will destroy this house with us all in it. So leave!”  
  
“Zorya Vechernyaya is right,” added Zora Utrennyaya. “We are not safe whilst you are here; you must leave. Immediately.”  
  
Somebody pressed something into Castiel’s slack hand, and he took it without thinking. “Keep this safe,” Czernobog said, as he curled Castiel’s fingers into a fist and trapped it beneath his own calloused palm. “Next time, you will play checkers with me.”  
  
“Do as Czernobog says,” said Zorya Utrennyaya. “Find Shadow, and I will see you again.”  
  
Castiel looked at her, but she didn’t look afraid: he could see the young woman in her toss her hair contemptuously, glaring at him with her hands on her hips. _Well?_ His brothers were so close now that he could feel their presence buzzing in the air, stirring every mote of dust with fine vibrations. The whole house seemed to be rattling.  
  
Castiel took one last look at Zorya Utrennyaya, and then flung himself forwards.

 

* * *

  
Castiel took flight across the world.  
  
In the Mumbai slums, a group of no less than fifteen witnesses swore they saw a man in a tan-coloured trenchcoat inexplicably appear in the middle of the street, cast them one wild look, and then vanish into mid-air.  
  
Somewhere in the Gulf of Mexico, a man aboard an offshore oil rig looked up for a moment and caught sight of a lonely figure standing out on the deck, who disappeared before the next swell broke.  
  
In Venice, a gondolier got a nasty shock when a man suddenly landed on the nose of his vessel, and overturned the entire craft into the canal.  
  
In Chicago, a dog sniffed and whined at a pair of wet shoeprints on the kitchen floor.  
  
On a beach in Adelaide, a man dropped out of nowhere and landed on a child’s sandcastle. He went heavily to one knee, his dark head bowed and his chest heaving. Then he struggled to his feet and threw himself onwards once more.  
  
In a Madagascan rainforest, there was a crash that went unnoticed by all but a few skittish animals, as a man fell forward into a curtain of trailing vines. He was gone before they even hit the forest floor.  
  
On the harsh Antarctic wastes, Castiel fell to his knees in the snow. The world started to buckle around him, and for a long moment darkness threatened the edges of his vision. Castiel clenched his fingers into the ground, clinging to the crust of the world as it spun ever faster beneath him. The sweat along his back began to chill beneath the harsh wind. He could no longer feel his brothers nipping at his heels, but that didn’t mean it was safe.  
  
With his last resource of energy Castiel hitched himself up on shaking legs, and compelled himself forwards.  
  
He collapsed in Egypt, spent.  
  
Presently, Castiel revived a little. He cast out for his brothers, but felt nothing except silence. That didn’t mean it would be sensible to stay in one place for too long, but at least he was no longer in any immediate danger. He was safe enough to rest, and for a while he lay on his back and stared at the sky, his body a useless sprawl of watery limbs. His borrowed heart felt as if it had been struck like a bell, and he could feel the reverb through every inch of his vessel, vibrating through his blood and buzzing on the surface of his skin.  
  
The phone in his pocket buzzed insistently. By the time he managed to remove it, the caller had already hung up. Castiel was surprised to find that his hands were shaking almost too much for him to read the screen.  
  
There was something else in his pocket. A checker piece, carved out of smooth, white wood, like a sand dollar. He turned it over in his hand, wondering.  
  
The phone rang again. He answered it. “Dean.” Dean wasn’t the only person who called Castiel on this phone, but he was the only one who might have called back a second time.  
  
Sure enough, it was Dean, and he sounded upset. “ _Jeez, Cas! Answer your goddamn phone, why don’t you?_ ”  
  
“Sorry,” said Castiel, automatically. “I was… busy.”  
  
Dean seemed to accept this excuse, and when he next spoke the anger had softened out of his voice. “ _I tried calling before, it said you were out of service. You okay?_ ”  
  
“I was in the Antarctic,” explained Castiel, without really explaining anything. His mouth felt strangely dry, and try as he might he couldn’t coax any moisture into it. He put it down to the heat of the sun, which would also explain the strange, shivery pressure in his head. “I’m in Egypt at the moment.”  
  
“ _So I’m paying out of the ass for this call? Good to know._ ”  
  
“You’re paying for it with a stolen credit card.”  
  
“ _Point,_ ” conceded Dean. “ _You busy?_ ”  
  
This was Dean’s oblique way of asking for help, and although Castiel’s entire being shook at the idea of having to take flight again so soon, he steeled himself and asked: “Where are you?”  
  
Dean recited the location of the motel they were staying in and then hung up, and Castiel reluctantly dragged himself to his feet. He felt stronger for the enforced rest, but it was clear that he had dangerously overtaxed himself. His vessel felt like a lead weight, and just standing was a monumental effort. The urge to tumble back to the sand was overwhelming, but inadvisable. Instead, Castiel forced himself to stand with the harsh resilience of a soldier.  
  
He allowed himself a handful of seconds to look out across his surroundings, the desert dunes stretching lazily as far as the eye could see until they blurred into the horizon. Then he disappeared, leaving behind a pair of footprints and a vague imprint of his vessel in the Saharan sand.  
  
He reappeared in the Winchesters’ motel room, and wobbled as the world briefly went out of alignment.  
  
“Whoah—hey!” Strong hands pressed against his chest, stopping him from simply toppling forwards onto the carpet. Castiel looked up blearily into Dean’s face. “Cas. _Cas_!”  
  
“I can hear you, Dean,” said Castiel peevishly, but he was discomforted to find that his irritation merely came out tired-sounding.  
  
He allowed Dean to guide him to sit on the bed, feeling weak and ashamed. He supposed he was also embarrassed; embarrassed that Dean and Sam had to see him like this, that he was reduced to looking so pathetic in front of them. He considered the Winchesters friends, yes, but also as comrades, fellow soldiers, and whilst he knew that they wouldn’t hold his weakness against him like his garrison would have done, something in Castiel rankled at appearing so feeble. He allowed Dean to settle him on the mattress, but something must have shown in Castiel’s expression because Dean didn’t fuss over him any further.  
  
The Winchesters had clearly been here for several days: the room was clean, but they’d started to settle, as evidenced by the clothes spilling out of the duffle, the drinks and snacks lined up on the table. Through the half-open bathroom door, Castiel could see their toothbrushes settled on the sink. He wanted to snap at them for getting so complacent. His near-escape from his brothers had made him wary of staying in one place for long, and the Winchesters should have known better than to create unnecessary work for themselves should they have to leave in a hurry.  
  
Beyond the window, LA moved in a ceaseless tide of people, locals and tourists, lights like neon jellyfish, and the endless, chattering noise, like the sound of the surf rasping over the sand. Los Angeles, Castiel thought somewhat deliriously, was a town of motion and friction. He had looked for his Father here once, looking for His face in every crowd, but there are no Gods in Los Angeles. The name, as far as he could gather, was ironic.  
  
Sam was eating some kind of noodle dish out of a cardboard container, and the scent of it was strong in the tiny room. Castiel found that his mouth was no longer dry, but rather the opposite: he had to swallow a sudden flood of saliva.  
  
“You sure you’re okay?” Dean asked, his expression skeptical.  
  
“I’m fine,” said Castiel quickly. He didn’t need to give Dean yet more burdens to carry, and anyway, this didn’t concern him. Finding his Father was Castiel’s mission, and he felt no need to share it with Dean. Even so, he found himself saying, “I was in Chicago this morning.”  
  
“I thought you were in Antarctica?”  
  
“I moved.”  
  
Dean got an expression that always seemed to trouble him when he realized that Castiel was able to move instantly and indiscriminately through time and place. Castiel found himself clinging to the look with a desperation that confused and discomforted him, so he asked, “did you need my help with something?”  
  
He couldn’t decipher the skitter of emotions across Dean’s face before he turned away, but Castiel suspected he might have exasperated him. Or offended him. It was sometimes difficult to tell with Dean, who kept his emotions close to his chest. Castiel made a mental note to ask Dean what he’d done wrong later.  
  
Now he attempted to put it from his mind, accepted the file that Sam handed him, and began to read.  
  
The top sheet was a missing persons report, courtesy of the LAPD. Castiel read it, and beneath it was another, different missing person. Beneath that, another. And another. And another.  
  
“How many?” Castiel asked.  
  
“Sixteen in the past six months,” said Sam. “That’s just the ones we know about. There’s barely any evidence; the cops only made the connection because of the way the victims’ stuff was dumped. Who knows how many slipped through the net. This thing could be doubling its body-count, and nobody would even know.”  
  
Castiel skimmed the details but Sam was right, the pattern was barely discernable: the victims were all male, and their clothes and personal belongings were disposed of in a similar manner, hidden inside trash-cans across the city. Other than that, they were all wildly disparate, the file consisting of men of all different ages, backgrounds, occupations. Nothing to connect them; nothing to even suggest they’d been murdered, apart from those little grocery bags full of personal belongings.  
  
“What makes you so sure that this is supernatural?” Castiel asked.  
  
Dean and Sam exchanged a look that Castiel couldn’t decipher. “We’re… not,” said Sam. “Except then I did some digging.” He indicated to the print-outs strewn across the desk. “It’s easier when you know what you’re looking for, but Cas… whatever this is, it’s been going on for a long time.”  
  
Castiel looked up sharply. “How long?”  
  
“Eighty years, give or take. Maybe longer. Too long to be human.”  
  
“Except whatever this is, it’s not leaving us much to go on,” said Dean. “Sam thinks he knows where this thing is hunting, but without witnesses…” Dean sighed in a manner that spoke volumes. “We figured we might get more from you. Any ideas?”  
  
Castiel thumbed through the details again, although he was already sure that it was useless. The creature’s lifespan meant it could only be a number of things, and its care in disposing of the evidence narrowed that list down even further, but Castiel could think of nothing which immediately fit the profile. If he was honest with himself, he still wasn’t convinced this was even a supernatural matter: the justification seemed flimsy at best. “Do you think this is related to the apocalypse?” he asked.  
  
“Honestly? We’re not sure _what_ to think.” Dean laughed and ran a hand through his hair, a gesture that Castiel recognized as exasperation. “We only came here as a favour to Bobby, and then we find out that whatever – whoever – this is, it’s racked up triple figures. Suddenly we’re not just looking for one victim, we’re following up hundreds of them!”  
  
“I don’t see what Lucifer could gain by this,” admitted Castiel, but no sooner had he said it than Dean and Sam’s expressions changed, and he felt compelled to add, “— but that doesn’t mean it isn’t relevant.”  
  
He set the file aside carefully, aware of Dean and Sam watching his every move.  
  
“I don’t know what’s behind this,” he admitted.  
  
“Then you’ve never heard of it happening before?” asked Sam.  
  
Castiel had heard tell of men disappearing, of course: in the first thousand years of his existence, his brothers had spoken uneasily of a Fatimid caliph who rode into the hills of his kingdom and disappeared, never to be seen again on Heaven or Earth, but it didn’t seem possible to connect the two. Even so, he couldn’t understand why he recalled this one story, or why his mind kept snagging on _Egypt_ as if it were somehow important. Castiel felt that same shivery touch along his back, and hesitated before he answered. “No, never.”  
  
Dean raised his hands and pressed them into his eye sockets, with a low, drawn-out groan. “So basically, we’re back to square one,” Dean said. Then, with more feeling: “ _Fuck_!”  
  
Castiel suddenly realized that Dean was tired, and that he had no idea why, and that the knowledge struck some deep, discordant chord inside of him. He had held Dean’s soul as he raised it from Perdition, an intimate act, and once it had been that he had known where Dean was at all times, his soul pulling Castiel’s compass like a magnetic North. Now, Dean was hidden from him both physically and metaphorically.  
  
“Whatever did this, it’s smart, and it’s gone a long time without being detected,” said Castiel, suddenly desperate to offer Dean some sort of consolation. “It wouldn’t leave the evidence of its kills anywhere they could be easily traced back; it’d leave them a safe distance away. Were you to plot all the locations of the evidence on a map, you may be able to… to narrow your focus.”  
  
“That sounds like something they’d do on _CSI_ ,” Sam said, and then appeared to swallow his tongue when Castiel merely blinked at him. “I mean… nothing. I think it could work. What do you think, Dean?”  
  
Dean uncovered his face enough to look at Castiel for a long moment, as if he had never seen him before. Then he sighed heavily, as if capitulation was a great hardship. “I guess it’s worth a try,” he said. “You staying to help? You can be in charge of the thumbtacks.”  
  
Castiel recognized the offer for what it was, which was why it was such a shame that he had to leave. Nonetheless, the lead that Czernobog had given him was pulling heavily on him, and he was hyper-aware of every second that he wasted not following it.  
  
He stood, and was grateful to find his vessel mostly back under his command.  
  
“Thank you, but I must continue my search,” he said.  
  
“Have you got a lead yet?” Sam asked, already busy making notations. Anybody else might have assumed that he was too distracted to care about the answer, but Castiel was proud to know otherwise.  
  
He considered what Czernobog had said. _Find him, then maybe you find your answers._  
  
It wasn’t a lot to go on, but it was enough. Castiel had faith.  
  
“I hope so,” he said, and in the next moment he was gone.

 

* * *

  
_Egypt._ Why did that seem so important?

 

* * *

  
It took three days of searching, but Castiel eventually found Easter in England. He felt bone-weary and ice-cold as he trudged across the grass towards her, his body weighing him down like an anchor. The weather was at least more hospitable than the last time he’d been here, but the winter had been unusually long and still had its claws dug into the spring, and the air was cold and heavy with the threat of rain. It seemed to seep into the very bones of Castiel’s vessel, taking root like a strangling plant. For the first time in his creation, Castiel craved warmth, and thought feverishly of soft sheets, central heating, and a comforter fluffy enough to drown in.  
  
Easter was picnicking beneath an old tree in Regent’s Park, so far away from the path that Castiel might have missed her had he not caught a glimpse of platinum-white hair. She was eating delicately from a chicken bone, but as he drew near she froze and watched him with big, green eyes, like a hare waiting to see if the hawk would pass it by. When Castiel merely drew closer, she put the chicken bone back in the Tupperware box and wiped her hands indelicately on her shirt.  
  
Castiel stumbled to a stop in front of her. This far away from the path the sounds of the world around them are muted, the roar of the road faraway, the laughter of the children a gentle bubbling. The hush was unearthly, and it made Castiel uneasy.  
  
“Wow,” said Easter, as she gave Castiel a slow up-and-down look. “You don’t look well.”  
  
Castiel didn’t know what to say to that, so he simply said: “I’m looking for Shadow.”  
  
“That’s… good?” said Easter. She still looked concerned. “Maybe you should sit down.”  
  
He told himself that he couldn’t resist the official invitation; doing so would be unwise, especially if he wanted Easter’s co-operation. Mostly, however, Castiel sank to the grass out of weariness rather than capitulation, having done so almost as soon as she finished talking. Easter dug one-handed in her picnic basket for a moment and returned with a metal Thermos flask, which she opened up, setting in front of her two cups.  
  
Close-up, she didn’t look so healthy herself. She was full-bodied, her hips and her breasts rounded and thick, curved in a way that Castiel recognized objectively as being attractive; Easter had the kind of figure that Dean Winchester might spare an appreciative glance for. However, the movie-star curls in her hair looked slick and artificial, and there were dark shadows smudged into the pale skin beneath her eyes. Beneath her beauty, Easter looked as worn and thinly-spread as Castiel felt.  
  
“Here.” She handed him one of the plastic cups, full of swirling, steaming tea. “You do take milk, don’t you? And sugar? I added some anyway. You look like a man who could use some sugar right now. Would you like something to go with it? A sandwich, perhaps?”  
  
The cup was warm enough to make Castiel’s palm sweat, and his body leeched heat from it greedily. It thawed some of the lingering coldness that had settled around him, and when he spoke again his voice sounded stronger. “No, thank you.”  
  
“Are you sure? They’re quite good.”  
  
“I’m sure.”  
  
He watched Easter stir some sugar into her own tea, her slim fingers holding the spoon delicately near the top, where it couldn’t be reached by the steam. The urge to begin questioning her gnawed at Castiel restlessly, but he sensed that this wasn’t the time; judging by the serenity on Easter’s face, this was a momentary respite for the both of them and Castiel felt loath to banish the feeling so soon. Besides, he told himself, it would benefit him to play to Easter’s affections like this.  
  
A bird landed in the grass nearby, so suddenly it was as if it had blinked into existence, and Castiel startled, tensing in readiness of a threat. But it was only a bird, hopping closer to them, its head tilted curiously. Looking at its beetle-black eyes made Castiel feel uncomfortable, but Easter reached into her basket and this time came out with a crumb of bread, which she threw to the small bird without comment. It took to the air in a gem-like glimmer, its new prize clutched in its beak.  
  
Easter watched it go, then turned back to Castiel with a smile.  
  
“Now,” she said, with the air of somebody settling down to business. “It’s been a long time since I saw one of you. Not in… gosh, not in two millennia, I should think. I still remember when one of you came down to see that poor girl, Mary. Does he still have that dent from where she broke that chair over his head?”  
  
“He has since taken another vessel,” said Castiel diplomatically.  
  
“I meant his pride. Oh, but you wouldn’t know anything about that, would you?” Easter said this without apparent unkindness, and then sipped her tea demurely. “How’s that going for you, by the way? That whole special bloodline thing? I hear you’ve got a nice young man lined up for Michael to use, put a stop to this mess we’re in. The poor lamb.”  
  
Castiel tried to imagine Dean’s reaction to being called a ‘poor lamb’ and found the thought almost too unpleasant to contemplate. “We’re looking at other options.”  
  
“Really?” Easter’s eyebrows shot up. “You mean the Host…”  
  
“No,” said Castiel, quickly. He was unprepared for the pang he felt at the words, at the sudden sense of loss, the sudden sense of _shame_. “The Host are proving…” he paused for a second before finishing, awkwardly: “It’s just me.”  
  
Easter looked briefly surprised, but then she seemed to recover. “Well, good for you!” she said, with a gentle punch to Castiel’s shoulder. “Goodness knows we need some more free-thinkers in _that_ particular organization. I mean, Michael was lovely, but he was always _such_ a terrible daddy’s boy.”  
  
Castiel made an unhappy, strangled sound in the back of his throat. Surely such blasphemy would not—  
  
“Oh, relax, they’re not going to waste their time with me,” said Easter, with a dismissive wave of her hand. Castiel saw no indication that her confidence was faked. “They think I’m some sort of happy-clappy hippy. They’d never in a million years waste their time with me, not when they’re busy smiting the wicked and breeding humans like Kennel Club dogs. Honestly, pedigree this, parentage that! That John Winchester was such a nice boy before your lot started meddling with him.” She heaved a gusty sigh. “I really had hoped that they’d leave him alone.”  
  
She looked away, and it seemed for a moment as if the springtime weather clouded over, becoming as gloomy and overcast as her mood. The wet chill began to gnaw at Castiel’s bones again, bringing with it that leaden sense of tiredness. He found himself wishing wistfully for another cup of hot tea; his was only half-gone, but it was beginning to cool.  
  
Ordinarily he wouldn’t have wished for anything, but the constant cold was becoming difficult to endure.  
  
“Easter,” he said. “I need your help.”  
  
Her smile was fond. “Of course you do,” she said gently. “You’re looking for Shadow. He was _lovely_.” Her face took on a wistful look before she visibly shrugged off whatever thought had settled upon her. “Again: meddling. Isn’t it always the way? Some days I think there just aren’t enough Gods anymore. But before, Shadow was everywhere, the center of attention. In the spotlight, if you will. Now he’s more difficult to find than sobriety at Mardi Gras.”  
  
Castiel thought of Dean, and the path his life had taken: the constant loss, the pain, the cruelty. He thought of Sam and his demon blood addiction. “This is my task,” he said, simply. “If this is the way it must be, then so be it. Others have seen worse.”  
  
Easter stared at Castiel for a long moment. Then, the corners of her mouth curved up and up, until her smile was as bright as the sun that peered out from behind the clouds.  
  
“What’s your name, angel?” she asked.  
  
“Castiel.”  
  
“I like you, Castiel,” Easter said. “I like you, so I’m going to give you a push in the right direction. Are you sure you wouldn’t like a sandwich?”  
  
Castiel blinked at the sudden non-sequiteur. “No… thank you.”  
  
“Shame. Next time we meet, promise me you’ll try one?”  
  
Castiel hesitated. He wasn’t ignorant to the power that promises given to a beings such as Easter could have, and although he found her pleasant, he didn’t want to make one with her. On the other hand, he very much doubted that there would be a ‘next time’. The future was a dark and uncertain place that Castiel had tried not to consider in too much depth, particularly when all that mattered to him was his current mission and nothing else.  
  
Easter was still watching him expectantly. Castiel weighed up the two options with the potential information that he could uncover, and came to a decision. “Of course.”  
  
“ _Promise_?”  
  
“I promise.” This time he didn’t hesitate. He was still a warrior of heaven, and he would do whatever necessary to complete his mission and serve his garrison, even at the expense of his own safety. He was but a tool – what had Dean called it? He was a hammer.  
  
Easter clapped her hands delightedly. “Excellent! I’ll hold you to that. Now, you were interested in Shadow?” At his affirmative, she took on an expression of deep – and Castiel thought feigned – contemplation. “Now, let’s see… I first met Shadow the year before last, in the company of a man called Mr. Wednesday. I’m afraid you’ll get no joy there: as far as I know, the man called Mr. Wednesday is dead, and nobody’s really seen him or Shadow since. I don’t know how it happened – I don’t keep up with those things myself. There are some other people you can try who might be able to help. Have you seen Czernobog?” Again, Castiel indicated the affirmative. “Oh, well. That’s tough.”  
  
She seemed to think for a moment or two, during which Castiel waited, his breath rising and falling in his borrowed lungs.  
  
Eventually, after a lot of _hmm_ ing and _hah_ ing, Easter said: “Mr. Nancy.”  
  
“I don’t know who that is.”  
  
“He’s… well, he’s Mr. Nancy.” Easter shrugged apologetically, as if she knew this fact wasn’t to Castiel’s liking. “I don’t know how else to describe him, and I’m afraid I don’t know where to find him. But, he was the last person to see Shadow before he disappeared, and I know who _might_ know where he is? I know, it’s not very helpful. I’m sorry. That’s the thing about us Old Gods: all of us know where the others are, and maybe even what they’re doing, but none of us has a direct line. It’s like the world’s most estranged family.”  
  
Castiel tried not to let his irritation show on his face, and reminded himself that any information was better than no information. As long as he had a lead, then he had a direction in which to follow it, and that direction would undoubtedly lead him to Shadow. If he found this Mr. Nancy, then it sounded as if it would be worth it.  
  
Still, he couldn’t deny that this development was… frustrating.  
  
“Are you familiar with Wisakedjak?” Easter barely waited for Castiel to answer before she continued: “He’s got pretty close, coyote-shaped ties with Nancy. If anybody is going to know where Nancy is, it’ll be Wisakedjak.”  
  
“And he’ll lead me to Shadow?”  
  
“He’ll lead you to Shadow,” Easter agreed. “Trust me, if anybody knows where that boy is, then it’s Nancy, the old swindler. There isn’t a lot he _doesn’t_ know, except maybe how to keep his nose out of other people’s business.” She said this not with malice, but rather good-natured amusement, and Castiel couldn’t help but notice that her eyes crinkled at the corners with the footprints of age.  
  
She was old, he realized. She spoke as if she was as old as him, perhaps even moreso. The unsettling part was that she was showing it. Immortal creatures had a strange relationship with death: death was a human disease and, even though he held more of a fondness for humanity than his brothers, seeing Easter so marked by it made Castiel feel sorry for her. Sorry and scared; he wondered if it was as easy to see on him.  
  
He jumped to his feet, so quickly that Easter looked at him in surprise. “Leaving already?”  
  
“I’ve much to do,” said Castiel gruffly. He looked away, focusing his attention on a patch of small flowers with white droplet petals. “Thank you for your assistance.”  
  
“It’s no problem,” said Easter. “Remember your promise, though.”  
  
“I’ll remember,” Castiel said. _Until the end of days_ , is what he didn’t say.  
  
He flinched when Easter reached out to grab his hand, but she merely held it urgently between her own, warm against his clammy skin. She had the look of somebody who was about to impart some important information, and once again Castiel felt that shiver of Fate.  
  
“I’ll be seeing you again, Castiel,” she said, not so much a promise as a statement of fact. His name sounded lyrical on her tongue. “Until then, good luck. I can’t say whether or not you’re on the right path, but I think I like it.”  
  
Castiel transported himself away with barely another word. He was already focused on the next part of his mission, because his mission was all that mattered: not Easter’s approval, not the kindness she had shown him, and not the promise he had made her. Still, the matter of the promise played on his mind, and he swore that he could feel Easter’s touch lingering long afterwards, a brand upon his skin.

 

* * *

 

Finding Wisakedjak proved more difficult than Castiel had anticipated; everybody knew him, and some had even been invited into his home, but nobody was able to tell Castiel where it was. Middle America was hot where England was cold, but after a day of trying to pick up the trail, Castiel grew to resent it just as much. The heat made him feel tired and deadheaded, and the thin material of his shirt clung to his spine with sweat. His skin still burned, but now it was upon his cheeks, and the back of his neck.  
  
As the sun started to set, Castiel found himself standing in the pink-hued dust outside the general store. A group of children watched him from the porch, their skinny arms wound around the railings, bare feet swinging against the wood. Castiel looked up the long, flat road reaching out to settle against the horizon. He looked the other way, which was much the same.  
  
“Hey, Mister!” one of the children called. “What’s that on your back?”  
  
Castiel glanced over. The speaker was a small, filthy boy, and he yowled indignantly when one of the older girls hit him over the back of the head. “Idiot!” she said. “Don’t you know anything? He’s an angel!”  
  
The boy rubbed his scalp and grumbled resentfully. “ _You’re_ the idiot,” he muttered.  
  
There was another girl perched on the railings, her hair tied in two straight pigtails. She cocked her head at Castiel with birdlike interest. “What’s up, Mr. Angel?” she asked. “Are you lost?”  
  
“Do you gotta find your way back to Heaven?” the boy piped up, evidently already having forgotten the reproachful sting of his sister’s hand. He seemed excited by the prospect.  
  
“He’s got wings, stupid. Why doesn’t he just fly home?”  
  
“You can see my wings?” Castiel asked.  
  
The older girl shrugged. “Sort of,” she said, but didn’t elaborate any further.  
  
“ _Are_ you lost?” the girl with pigtails asked, with more urgency.  
  
“I don’t know,” said Castiel.  
  
“That means you’re not.” Another girl spoke up for the first time, her voice solemn and self-assured. “Do you know where you’re going? If you know where you’re going, then you’re not lost.” So saying, she swung down from the railing and ran away without a word. Castiel watched her until he could no longer make her out by anything other than the clouds of dust that her feet kicked up, until she could just as easily be coyote as child.  
  
“You heard her,” the older girl said. Castiel noticed that her nails were painted deep, dark purple, and that they scuffed the ground when she swung her foot; she was the most teenaged of all of them, and as such was losing interest fast. “Where are you going?”  
  
“I’m looking for Wisakedjak,” said Castiel.  
  
Several of the children giggled, and then caught it behind their hands, their eyes shining at Castiel in mirth. The girl scowled a dark scowl. “ _Diiyá_!” she said to the other children, with a note of command in her young voice. “ _Diiyá_! Go on!” She continued in this vein until all of the children had slid down and run away, and all that was left was a cloud of dust and a single, bejewelled hair tie.  
  
The teenage girl swung herself down onto the porch with a _thud_. “You mean Inktomi,” she said. She picked the hair-tie up and wound it around her fingers; her nails were painted bright yellow, the colour of sunflowers. “He lives on the reservation; I can take you to him. Not for free,” she added quickly.  
  
“I don’t have any money,” Castiel said, which was a lie. He had five dollars in his pocket.  
  
“Liar,” the girl said. “You have five dollars in your pocket.”  
  
Castiel tensed immediately. “How did you know that?”  
  
The girl grinned her dark, wicked grin, which did nothing to assuage Castiel’s wariness. “It’s in my blood,” she said, as if this were something to be proud of. “All the women in my family have the Sight.”  
  
The mirth disappeared from her face as quickly as it came, and she placed her hands on her hips, scowling sullenly. “Now, do you want me to take you to Inktomi or not? Five dollars, non-negotiable.”  
  
Castiel sensed nothing evil in this girl, which was little comfort: his own angelic perceptions were waning along with his Grace, and he could no longer sense his own brothers even when they were right in front of him. Still, the girl seemed to be in the surly place between childhood and adolescence; she had the look of somebody who had spent an hour styling her hair that morning, only to forget herself and tumble it free in the dust. She wore jewellery, but it was colourful and blocky, cheap children’s stuff. Castiel wondered briefly if that was what she was going to spend the five dollars on.  
  
Still, the Sight was a dangerous gift for someone so young to wield unfettered. Once upon a time his orders would have been to kill this girl on sight, and now he was thinking of soliciting her assistance. The road to Hell indeed.  
  
“Take me to him,” Castiel said in his most authoritative tones. “Then you’ll have your money.”  
  
The girl’s eyes narrowed into dark slits. “And I’m supposed to trust you… why?”  
  
“You wouldn’t trust an angel of the Lord?”  
  
“I wouldn’t trust God himself,” came the sharp reply. “No, give me the five dollars up front or I walk away and you spend the rest of the day looking. There’s thirty-thousand square miles of land in this rez, and Inktomi isn’t in any of them. So. Your choice.”  
  
Castiel thought about it for a few moments. Then he pulled the crumpled five dollars from his pocket, and pressed it into the girl’s palm, half-expecting her to run away. “If you break your word…”  
  
“ _Tch_!” the girl scoffed, in a manner that she had undoubtedly learned from her aforementioned mothers and grandmothers. “You paid, didn’t you? What kind of deadbeat do you think I am? Come on, though. I haven’t got all day.”  
  
As she walked away, flat-footed and loose-hipped, Castiel followed and marvelled at how such a young creature could be filled with such arrogant world-weariness. She knew next to nothing, and yet she behaved as if she knew everything; Castiel found her pride vexing. Even so, there was a promise in her that he already knew would bloom into something beautiful; her colourful plastic jewellery and self-assured confidence would develop into a unique personality. Castiel wondered if he would have been able to smite her without shame, and he realized that he wasn’t sure which would be the more unpleasant answer: as an angel he may have been capable of guiltless destruction, but his newfound ability to see the world in shades of grey was… worrying.  
  
The girl led him through the dusty, uneven roads, her stride unhurried even as the sun dropped lower and lower in the sky. They passed other citizens along the way, many of whom looked at Castiel suspiciously, some of whom quickly averted their eyes and hurried onwards. Several cars caked in gravel-chalk slowed to a crawl as they passed, so that they could peer at Castiel closely. Castiel felt exposed beneath their stares, and he found himself winding tighter and tighter like a coiled spring, his palms burning with restless violence.  
  
She didn’t talk to Castiel, which was fine by him. Some of the older denizens called out to her as they passed, sounding concerned or intruiged, but her replies were always terse. Once they walked by a group of children who jeered and sang at Castiel, until the girl tossed a sharp gesture over her shoulder that made them all boo and scatter.  
  
Eventually, the girl glanced at Castiel and asked: “What’s your name?”  
  
“Why?”  
  
She shrugged. “I wanted to see if I recognized it. I only really know the main four.”  
  
The reminder of Castiel’s archangel brothers was particularly unwelcome, and he found himself saying: “If I were one of them, then you’d be dead right now.”  
  
If she was bothered by his tone, then the girl didn’t say it. “Figures. Aren’t they supposed to be warriors or some shit?” She cast Castiel a deeply unimpressed look out of the corner of her eye. “You don’t look much like a fighter, so what does that make you? One of the ones that sing praises? _Hosannah, hosannah_ , and all that junk?”  
  
“No.”  
  
They didn’t speak after that.  


* * *

  
  
They walked for a little over half an hour. The girl – Castiel never thought to ask her name; such things were irrelevant – took him to the foot of a shallow hill and then stopped on the edge of the gravel road. Castiel looked up at the ramshackle house, placed on the side of the hill as if left there by the hands of a careless God. It appeared to be deserted, the grimy windows blank and black like tired old eyes. Castiel looked back at the girl, who was fidgeting and glancing up at the orange-blushed sky as if she had a pressing engagement elsewhere.  
  
“Well, it’s been fun,” she said, insincerely, “but what happens next is your business, not mine. You fulfilled your end of the bargain, I fulfilled mine, end of story. So… bye.”  
  
She waited for a second longer, as if to see if Castiel would try to stop her, or at least return the sentiment. When he simply stared up at the house, she rolled her eyes and began to walk away, muttering _You’re welcome, asshole_ under her breath.  
  
Without looking away from the house, Castiel called, “What will you do with the five dollars?”  
  
The girl stopped and looked back at him for a second, her eyebrows peaked high on her face. Then she snorted and shook her head, still with that same expression of incredulity, and walked away without another word.  
  
Castiel stood for a moment longer in the dying light, then started walking up the hill.

 

* * *

  
It was a strange experience, knocking on Wisakedjak’s door and waiting patiently for him to answer. Castiel didn’t use to care for such human customs, and he wondered when that had changed. Was it when his Grace diminished so much that picking fights became unwise, or was it just something he had picked up on his time on Earth, like dirt clinging to his soul?  
  
He was still contemplating it when the door eased open, revealing a greying coyote of a man, with keen eyes and a jagged mouth. He leaned against the frame, revealing a dark, wet shadow on his undershirt, and yawned expansively. The sight of him resonated some deep, unhappy chord inside Castiel, the vibrations of it a slight distraction, a warning so vague that he went against his better judgement and ignored it.  
  
“Wisakedjak—” he began, but he was cut off almost immediately.  
  
“Sorry-looking beast wakes me from a nap, and yet I still feel like I should apologize to him,” the old man said, in a deep voice, like a dog’s bark. “I tell you now, you won’t find what you’re looking for here.”  
  
Castiel felt the disappointment crashing around him like the cold ocean, bringing with it that sense of exhaustion, of being worn down and worn away. “You can’t help me,” he said, even though he already knew the answer.  
  
Wisakedjak sighed and stepped away from the door. “Might as well come in,” he said. “We’ll see what I can do for you. Feed you up, maybe. You look like you could use it.”  
  
_No_ , thought Castiel. _I need to get back to my mission_. But with his best lead suddenly extinguished in front of his eyes he felt strangely numb and, with nowhere else to go, he stepped through the door into the smoky darkness of Wisakedjak’s cabin. He let himself be subtly corralled into a seat, and watched as Wisakedjak lit the old stove and placed a pot on the burner. That done, he opened the fridge and stuck his entire upper body inside with a groan that might have been satisfaction or the rigours of age.  
  
“Easter said that you’d be able to help me,” said Castiel, with an edge of accusation. “She said that if anybody knew where Mr Nancy was, it would be you.”  
  
Wisakedjak lifted a plastic bowl out of the fridge with both hands and began to prise the lid off. “I haven’t seen Nancy in many months. He could be dead, for all I know. Too many of the Old Gods are dead. Let me tell you this,” he finally popped the lid off the tureen, and Castiel saw that it was filled with thick, viscous soup, which smelt strongly of turkey, “once upon a time, this used to be a good land for Gods. Now, it is a good land for nobody.” He heaved the bowl up and began to pour it into the pot with a thick slopping sound. “Less people farm the land now; why would they stay here, when they’ve seen the world on their television screens? This is the way it goes: the Old Gods fall to the New Gods. Media. Technology. _Television_. Better to just accept it.”  
  
“What are you telling me?”  
  
“I remember when the white man took over this land.” Wisakedjak sat down heavily in one of the chairs opposite Castiel. His gaze was pale, stern and a little sad. “They fought my people, and when the white man lost, which wasn’t often, they made treaties. Then they broke the treaties, so they won anyway. I know a lost cause when I see one.”  
  
“This is the only way,” said Castiel.  
  
“No, it’s not. Because when the white man get bored on this land, they leave, they go to New York and Las Vegas. And if enough of them leave, then we can take back this land again. We sacrifice this land so that we may reclaim it later. We play the long game.”  
  
The scent of cooking food began to fill the cabin, overpowering the wood-smoke, and Castiel found his mouth watering and his belly rumbling. Even so, he found himself standing, drawing his purpose around himself like armour, and saying: “Stop. I’m not interested in your advice. _Do you know where I can find Mr Nancy?_ ”  
  
Wisakedjak looked up at Castiel coolly. “Sit down, angel,” he commanded. “You need to eat.”  
  
“What I need is to continue in my search for my Father,” said Castiel, in a voice that rattled the windows in their panes and shook pebbles down the sides of the hill. “If you’re not able to help me, then don’t hinder me. I’ll ask again: do you know where I can find him?”  
  
The silence that followed seemed to ring, tension buzzing thick in the air. On the stove, the pot of soup began to bubble loudly. Wisakedjak held Castiel’s furious gaze, and Castiel thought he detected a hint of anger in those still depths. The sight of it made him feel savagely triumphant: yes, let him provoke these false gods, then. He was tired of their insolence, their misdirection, their constant riddles and unreliable whispers.  
  
“This is a fool’s errand,” Wisakedjak said. “Your Father is dead. Leave it at that.”  
  
“So you are useless,” said Castiel, and without another word, disappeared.  
  
In the silence that followed Castiel’s absence, the pot on the stove began to boil over.  
  
Without looking at it, Wisakedjak clicked his fingers, and silence fell once more.

 

* * *

  
Angrily, Castiel threw himself as far as he could go, and landed on the observation deck of the St. Peter’s dome. There, he sat down and glared out across the twinkling lights of the city, the night wind whipping his face and stinging his skin. The rage burned incandescent inside him, and he realized belatedly that he was clenching and unclenching his fists, his teeth grinding together so hard that he felt the pain in the roots.  
  
Castiel had come here looking for God once, at the beginning of his search. He had hoped that his Father would be drawn to the religious splendour, even as he knew that such a thing was blasphemous: he was more likely to find God in a cave as in a cathedral. But being here gave him some small measure of comfort, and it was a place that he kept returning to, to gaze out across the city and let the cool air wash away his irritations. Now, although he found no solace in the religious designs of man, the sight of it reassured him; how could his Father be dead, when he engendered such devotion?  
  
He wasn’t sure how long he sat there. Long enough for the sun to start rising on the distant horizon; long enough for his anger to burn itself out. Long enough for him to accept his situation. This was Castiel’s trial, he knew: just as Abraham was commanded to kill his own son, just as Dean Winchester was asked to give himself up to Michael, this was Castiel’s test, his leap of faith.  
  
He would not fail. He would not fall.  
  
There was a text message on his phone from Dean, sent earlier that day. Castiel must not have felt it during his search for Wisakedjak. _Need ur help_ , it read. _Plz come 2 motel._  
  
Castiel cast one look out across the world, and then took flight.

 

* * *

  
It was late when Castiel arrived in the Winchesters’ motel room, and he could instantly make out their shapes beneath the sheets, could hear them breathing evenly in the darkness. He didn’t wake them. Sometimes Castiel forgot about such paltry things as timezones, and after the first time he shook Dean awake at three in the morning, he knew better than to impose himself upon their rest. Instead, he glanced at the scattered papers on the table, of which there were more than last time: it looked like Sam was beginning to research Eastern mythologies as well as Western.  
  
There was a fluorescent square of paper positioned conspicuously on top of the pile. On it, Sam had written three words in messy, jagged scrawl: _VAMPIRE? SUCCUBUS? ASK CAS._  
  
Behind Castiel, the television roared to life in a hiss of static, lighting up the room. He dropped the scrap of paper and whirled.  
  
On the screen, a petite woman in her underwear writhed provocatively, her arms lifting the thick curtain of her hair. The sight of her, the unashamed sexuality of her, made Castiel’s blood fizz. She grinned at him for a second like she knew exactly what he was thinking, her eyes sooty and sultry beneath lowered lids. She seemed to pulse in time with the music, her hips moving with the beat. _Take it, take it, baby, baby…_  
  
“ _Castiel?_ ” she said, her voice loud and clear in the silence. “ _We need to talk._ ”  
  
Castiel stared for a moment, feeling the unease dripping along his spine like ice water. He turned around and looked at Sam and Dean, who slumbered on peacefully in a way that he knew they wouldn’t unless magic was involved.  
  
“ _Don’t worry, I took care of them_ ,” the woman confirmed his thoughts. “ _It’s just us_.”  
  
“Who are you?” Castiel demanded of the television. “What did you do to them?”  
  
“ _Easy, honey_ ,” the woman wrapped her arm around the pole behind her and then followed the movement with her whole body. “ _They’ll wake up, eventually. I just wanted to make sure we weren’t interrupted._ ”  
  
Castiel squared his shoulders, his wings suddenly unfurling, striping the room in shadow. “ _Tell me who you are!_ ” he said, and the image on the screen briefly disappeared beneath a fuzz of white noise.  
  
When it returned, the woman had stopped moving and was holding her skull, wincing. “ _Now that’s not very nice, is it?_ ” she said, with a waxy red pout. “ _You’re standing at my altar now, the least you could do is show me some respect._ ”  
  
“You’re another false god,” snarled Castiel, briefly rattling the windows.  
  
The picture dissolved and came back a second later, and Castiel was inexplicably watching the television show that Dean liked to pretend he didn’t watch: _Doctor Sexy M.D_. It was a re-run of an older episode that he’d caught Dean watching before, in which Doctor Sexy was berated by a female colleague for his promiscuity. ‘ _… if you don’t love me, then for God’s sake, just stop playing with me!_ ’  
  
“ _And as for you,_ ” she snarled, whirling on the screen. “ _There’s nothing false about me. I’m Old School, Castiel. People sacrifice to me on an hourly basis – millions of them, even. One of my disciples is even laying in that bed behind you, so how about you watch your tone?_ ”  
  
The picture changed again, and this time Castiel was watching a young woman haughtily fixing her lipstick with a pocket mirror. Castiel recognized this programme as well, about the socialite teenagers – again, their problems seemed to stem mostly from promiscuity. Before he could speak, the girl snapped her mirror shut between lacquered nails and addressed him in a voice like a bird’s caw.  
  
“ _I hear you’ve been asking questions_ ,” she said. “ _Looking for a man called Shadow._ ”  
  
“That’s none of your concern.”  
  
She rolled her eyes. “ _Look,_ ” she said, “ _you might as well give up now and save yourself the effort. Your daddy ain’t coming home, kiddo. This is the new age: even the angels come equipped with cellphones_.” Her glossy lips pulled into a smile that was as fake as everything about her. “ _Your father? He’s a novelty gift shop, a horse-drawn cart ride; we’re the shopping malls, the high-speed internet, the round-the-clock news coverage. We’re able to project antipathy into people’s homes 24/7. We give them a reason to doubt the Old Gods_.” The girl smiled as a boy glided onscreen and pressed a kiss to her cheek, but her eyes were still fixed on Castiel, and her expression was malevolent. “ _You guys never did learn how to move with the times. Is it really any surprise that you’re getting left behind?_ ”  
  
Castiel clenched his fists until his nails dug into the soft skin of his palms. “What do you want from me?” he snarled.  
  
The screen dissolved again, and then the scantily-dressed woman from before was back, along with the pulsing music. _Come on rude boy, boy can you get it up_. She leaned down to speak into the camera, giving Castiel a perfect view of her soft, full breasts, and he felt himself blush hot all over.  
  
“ _Consider this a friendly warning,_ ” she said, with a shark-tooth smile. “ _The Old Gods are dead, and the New Gods rule. So back off, and we won’t have to put you down._ ”  
  
The casual threat shocked Castiel cold, but it was followed by that same hot fury, re-ignited by her arrogance. The idea that he, Castiel, an _angel of the Lord_ , would take orders from a false god. The presumptuousness of it! Wordlessly, he leaned down towards the screen until their faces were inches apart, and she had become a series of bright neon pixels. With his other hand, he felt behind the set for the power socket, and he was gratified to see the woman’s dark eyes dart from side to side, as if she were afraid of what he was doing behind her back.  
  
“ _What are you doing?_ ” she demanded. “ _Castiel, what are you doing?!_ ”  
  
“To borrow a phrase,” Castiel said, as his fingers closed around the plug, “ _bite me_.”  
  
He yanked, and had a split-second close-up of the woman’s face contorted in fury, before the screen went dead.  
  
Behind him, Dean stirred and woke. His voice was a grouchy slur of syllables in the gloom, distorted by the way he pawed and pulled the sleep from his own face. “Cas? S’like, two in the morning, what’re you…” Dean trailed off, and Castiel could only assume that he had spotted him, kneeling warily in front of a dead television set, because when Dean next spoke he sounded more alert: “Cas? What’s wrong?”  
  
The screen stayed dead, the only image in it a reflection of Castiel’s face, so he finally dropped the plug and stood.  
  
“Nothing, Dean. Sorry to disturb you.”  
  
In the other bed, Sam rustled and said: “S’that Cas?”  
  
Dean was still looking between Castiel and the television, his expression suspicious, but Castiel remained deliberately impenetrable. He knew that Dean would only try and pursue the matter at a later date, possibly when he thought that Castiel was distracted enough not to notice. Castiel wouldn’t say a word. The woman’s thinly-veiled threat still weighed heavily on his mind: _one of my disciples is even laying in that bed behind you, so how about you watch your tone?_ If he told Dean what had transpired here tonight, there was the chance that the woman might retaliate.  
  
Besides, it was none of Dean or Sam’s concern what Castiel did on his search for his Father. He was more than able to shoulder this mission, and the dangers it bought, alone. To involve them unnecessarily would be… a sign of weakness on his behalf.  
  
Instead, he used a classic redirection technique. “You wanted to speak to me?”  
  
“Yeah, not at freakin’ two in the morning!” said Dean, but he didn’t take the bait. “Seriously, Cas, what’s up with you lately? You’ve been acting weirder than usual, and I’ve gotta say, it’s not really inspiring confidence. Is it some sort of secret renegade angel business, or what?”  
  
“If I said ‘yes’, would you be satisfied?”  
  
Castiel caught the flash of hurt in Dean’s eyes, quick as a silver-fish disappearing into the dark of Dean’s cold, unfathomable expression. “I thought we were a team,” he said. “Damn it, Cas. We’re a _team_ , remember? What if—”  
  
For a moment Castiel was sure that Dean was about to say _What if something happened to you_ , and he cut in smoothly before it could happen. “Dean. Do you really have time to help me with my mission?”  
  
“… No.”  
  
“Then we must divide our resources accordingly,” Castiel said. Dean looked mutinous at this, so he softened slightly and added, “I must do this alone, Dean. I need to exist for a purpose beyond yours, if I’m to call this any kind of existence.” At this he stopped, worried that he had said too much; judging by Sam’s suddenly sympathetic expression, he had.  
  
Dean looked away as if embarrassed by Castiel’s candour and dropped the subject, which was what Castiel had wanted. It didn’t matter that even his truth was only a half-truth: Castiel would gladly follow Dean if Dean asked it of him, and may even have relished sharing Dean’s purpose, but he knew that he could not continue his mission in such circumstances. Although some small part of Castiel longed for the days when his decisions were handed down to him and not grimly fought for, he had to find his Father. If that required him to suffer, to become more human with each step, then that was Castiel’s trial, his long walk through the desert. There would be a reward at the end of it, he was sure. He would reach his Promised Land.  
  
“You wanted to see me,” he prompted again, hoping to distract them.  
  
Sure enough, after sharing a quick, uncertain glance that conveyed their unease with the situation, the brothers seemed to relent. Dean sat up and flicked on the lamp, squinting against the bitter stab of white light, and Sam slid from his bed. Castiel was as sure as he could be that the woman in the television had been rendered harmless, but he made sure to block the set with his body as Sam passed by.  
  
“We’ve been looking through the police reports,” Sam was saying, as he shuffled papers and books from their positions on the motel table. “There’s not much to go on – a lot of the evidence mysteriously went ‘missing’,” he said scornfully, “but there’s something, they probably couldn’t suppress it because it was a cop…”  
  
He handed Castiel something: a small, black notebook, hinged at the top, the kind of thing that they called a journalist’s notebook. It was puffy with water damage, the corners turned with age, and filled with pages of sloping, jagged handwriting.  
  
“Jerry LeBec, LAPD,” said Sam, by way of explanation. “He fit with all the other victims, and when we went to see his widow, she gave us this, said that he’d been, and I quote, ‘working on something big’ before his death. Except his records show he wasn’t really working on _anything_ at the time of his death. Whenever it was, it wasn’t official.”  
  
Castiel flipped to the final pages of the notebook, where the writing had devolved into a barely decipherable tangle of letters, written as if in frantic haste. It made the chicken-scratch handwriting at the beginning of the notebook look elegant and, try as he might, Castiel could only pick out an isolated phrase amidst the chaos, written as if with laborious care: _I adjure you, daughters of Jerusalem_. He was surprised to find that he recognized the phrase immediately, his whole body resonating with the memory.  
  
“ _Shir ha-Shirim_ ,” Castiel murmured.  
  
“It’s not in order, but… yeah,” said Sam.  
  
Castiel waited for further information, but when none was forthcoming he looked up to find Sam and Dean watching him, the atmosphere in the room different than he remembered. It took him moment or two to realize that the silence surrounding them was awkward, thick with sudden tension.  
  
“Cas…” Sam began. “Is it possible that whatever did this is… Biblical?”  
  
_That_ he hadn’t expected. “You think one of my brothers is the culprit.”  
  
“You’ve got to admit, it fits,” said Sam, as if he didn’t want to. “I mean, think about it: whatever did this is almost two centuries old. It’s functionally immortal. It’s clearly able to adapt – we know angels can take other vessels to avoid being detected, and we know they’re smart. And now this…” he gestured at the little notebook and quirked his mouth ruefully. “You’ve got to admit, it seems like the most likely suspect, but mostly we’re looking for any lead we can get. Is there anything you can think of?”  
  
There wasn’t. Castiel knew this as soon as he looked back down at the notebook: the words stirred something in his memory, a gentle scrape that set alarm bells ringing, but whatever it was was faint, inconsequential. He got the sense that he was missing something here but, try as he might, he couldn’t quite…  
  
“I’m sorry,” he said, as he handed Sam the notebook and tried not to watch his face fall. “Perhaps it’s because I’m less than I was, but I can’t…”  
  
For a moment he was sure that Sam was about to make his disappointment known, and braced for it like one might brace for a lash, anticipating the neat, cleansing pain of it. Instead, Sam took the notebook from Castiel, composing his expression into one of careful neutrality, and Castiel felt the ragged bite of frustration. They had asked him for help and he had been unable to aid them – why cover that up? Why ignore it?  
  
“That’s fine, man,” he said. He was a better liar than Dean. “We’ll figure it out. Just… if you think of anything, we could really use the help, all right?”  
  
“All right,” said Castiel. He had been bracing for Sam’s casual cruelty, and now that it wasn’t forthcoming he found himself filled with angry, restless energy. His palms itched with the need to unleash that pent-up frustration, and he wished fervently for a demon attack. The realization that he probably wouldn’t be able to banish the demon with his Grace only made him more irritated.  
  
He caught sight of the map spread across the motel wall, coloured push-pins casting long, finger-like shadows, and, in an effort to distract himself, asked: “You plotted the evidence on this map?”  
  
“What?” Sam followed Castiel’s gaze. “Oh, yeah.”  
  
“Did you find a pattern?”  
  
It was a redundant question. As he stepped closer to the board, Castiel could see that the pins formed a shape not unlike a cyclone, the swirl of pins getting denser and denser until they suddenly stopped, leaving an almost-blank space about the size of eight city blocks. Castiel leaned forwards to read the street names, squinting in the meagre light.  
  
“You think whatever you’re following lives within this space?” he asked.  
  
“Looks that way,” said Sam. “We swept the area with an EMF meter, just in case, but Cas… unless we know what we’re looking for, it’s kind of a needle in a haystack.”  
  
In the gloom, Sam looked and sounded exhausted. Dean didn’t seem to be faring much better, and Castiel thought he could see the way the apocalypse was weighing heavily on both of them. He was no sympathizer to the strains of duty; once he had been content to console himself with the knowledge that destiny and purpose was awarded, not chosen, and thus incontrovertible. He would never have thought to help a member of his garrison like he helped Sam and Dean. Now looking at Sam and Dean’s tired faces made him feel inadequate, and he realized that the anger he felt was for himself, and the regret for them.  
  
The thought terrified him. Suddenly the room seemed stifling as opposed to friendly, and the unspoken knowledge of Castiel’s failings seemed to occupy every corner. Castiel’s breath seemed to come quicker and shallower in his vessel’s lungs, and he found himself speaking.  
  
“I must go,” he said. Sam and Dean looked up as if to stop him, but he carried on, overriding them both. “You need to rest. I’ll let you know if I think of anything useful.”  
  
He threw himself away without waiting for their answer.  
  
In other words: Castiel panicked.

 

* * *

  
Three days later found Castiel sitting in a diner in Denver, no further on his mission. He had attempted to find another lead to take him to Nancy or Shadow without success; it was as if the Old Gods had closed ranks against him. He’d even gone back to see Czernobog, but the little apartment was silent as the grave, and Castiel had stood on the doorstep for twenty minutes before realizing that nobody was going to open it to him. He’d searched for Easter as far as Japan, but had found only gloomy, overcast weather that chilled him right down to the bone, bringing back that leaden sense of exhaustion.  
  
Denver was warm, at least, and after a night searching the deserted, dripping streets of Takamatsu, Castiel was enjoying the gentle bubble of activity around him. He excused it with the knowledge that his Father could have easily been here as anywhere, but Castiel had to admit that there was a certain amount of comfort to be found in this place regardless. He stopped short of drinking the coffee he had purchased, but he enjoyed the feel of the mug between his hands, the rich, bitter scent—  
  
It was chance that had him glancing up, and the sight of Gabriel sitting opposite him in the booth made Castiel jerk in surprise, his hand twitching automatically towards the table-knife. He hadn’t even felt the archangel’s presence. That was worrying.  
  
Gabriel watched the movement with something like pity. “That’s kind of a _human_ reaction, don’t you think?”  
  
The urge to unfurl his true form gripped Castiel for a moment, a natural reaction to coming up against a predator of Gabriel’s ilk, and he felt himself begin to shuck off his vessel like a husk. Nonetheless, it was his soldier’s instincts that kept him in place; even reduced as he was, Castiel still recognized Gabriel as his commanding officer and deferred accordingly. He slipped only enough for the glow to escape his eyes, the inside of his mouth when he spoke: “Gabriel.”  
  
“Stand down, Castiel,” Gabriel said, his voice light but his eyes betraying the order for what it was, and Castiel subsided back into his vessel before he even made the decision to do so.  
  
“What do you want?” he said.  
  
In answer, Gabriel clicked his fingers and magicked a plate of pancakes in front of him, along with a coffee topped with a tower of whipped cream. Another click, like an afterthought, and a jug of syrup appeared, tinged red like watered-down blood. Castiel watched as Gabriel poured so much syrup over his pancakes that, when he cut into them, his knife and fork skidded across his plate.  
  
“Aren’t I allowed to check up on my favourite renegade angel?” Gabriel asked, before he transferred a generous forkful of food into his mouth. “I mean, apart from me, obviously.”  
  
It occurred to Castiel then that Gabriel was no longer _anybody’s_ commander, no longer worthy of that title or the respect that went with it. _You_ ** _left_** , he thought, so that when he put his hands down on the table, the silverware began to clatter noisily.  
  
“ _Gabriel_ ,” he said, in a voice like a thunderstorm. The windows rattled.  
  
Gabriel didn’t bother to swallow his food before he started talking, although Castiel couldn’t tell whether or not this was because he was genuinely afraid or just uncouth. “Alright, alright,” he garbled, holding his hands up in a way that might have been non-threatening, had Castiel not been painfully aware of what Gabriel could do to him with a table knife. “No need to lay on the angel of the Lord bullshit, okay?”  
  
He stopped, and Castiel waited, power crackling over his skin like electricity. He knew that the ability to strike first would probably save his life in this situation, and tried to convince himself that he could do so. If Gabriel attacked him, he reasoned, then Gabriel became an obstacle to Castiel’s mission; under those circumstances, he left Castiel no choice.  
  
“I heard you’ve been looking for Shadow,” Gabriel said.  
  
Panic gripped Castiel again, and he fought desperately against its clawing grip. “How do you know that?”  
  
“Um, hello? _Trickster_!” Gabriel rolled his eyes expressively, in a manner that set Castiel’s teeth on edge. “Besides, I’ve been keeping an eye on you. Second favourite renegade angel, remember?” He stuffed another forkful of pancake into his mouth, and somehow managed not to lose a single drop of syrup in the process. “How are the Hardy Boys, anyway? Still in the City of Angels?”  
  
Castiel sat to attention like a dog scenting its prey. “What do you know about—”  
  
“I know that you should know better,” said Gabriel. “Anyway, we were talking about you. Shadow, remember?”  
  
“I think he might know where to find our Father.”  
  
The good cheer in Gabriel’s eyes seemed to dim slightly at that, his chewing slowing down, until he was looking at Castiel as if disappointed by what he saw. This time he swallowed before speaking. “He can’t help you, Castiel. Whatever you’re hoping to find in Shadow, I can promise you that it’s not going to happen. He’s not that type of man.”  
  
“So you know where he is.”  
  
“Nancy is the only one who knows where Shadow is,” said Gabriel, darkly. “But he’s been gone for months. Do you know why? Because he drew too much attention. And now, hey, guess what? _You’re_ drawing it too.” Gabriel put his fork down with a clatter. “I’m telling you now, Castiel: _leave it_. You’ve already met Television, trust me, you don’t want to see the others.”  
  
Castiel tensed in readiness of an attack, but Gabriel merely looked at him challengingly.  
  
“Why are you telling me this?” Castiel growled.  
  
Gabriel sprawled back in his chair, with a shrug. “Call it a courtesy. For not turning me in.” Was it Castiel, or was there a note of accusation in that statement? He thought guiltily of Anna. “I mean it, Castiel. You couldn’t be less subtle if you tried, and certain agencies are starting to take notice… trust me, you don’t want them to do that.”  
  
Castiel’s phone buzzed against his hip, and he pulled it out without thinking; Dean only texted him when he needed Castiel for something, and Castiel was so conditioned that he barely spared a thought for the archangel sitting in the booth opposite him.  
  
The text contained an L.A. address, along with Dean’s trademark bad spelling: _Need ur help com quick_.  
  
“Funny, if I didn’t know better, I’d almost say he has you on a leash,” said Gabriel.  
  
Castiel looked up, startled, in time to see Gabriel starting on his hot chocolate, licking his spoon clean of cream in a way that could only be described as _salacious_. The sight of it made Castiel feel slightly unwell, and he stood up so quickly that he barked both knees on the table, suddenly aching to get out of there. “I need to go.”  
  
Gabriel twirled the spoon in a _carry on_ gesture. “By all means.”  
  
With no small amount of gratitude, Castiel took flight.  
  
He found the address without incident: a derelict building not far from where the map had indicated the creature’s territory lay. His mind already racing, Castiel landed.  
  
Immediately, something hit him with enough force to throw him clear across the building.  
  
His jaw aching and his head ringing, Castiel roused painfully, a rusty groan tearing free from his blood-slick lips. He’d bitten his vessel’s tongue as he landed, and now most of it was smeared stickily across his cheek and the back of his hand. His head felt as though something inside it was trying to escape, banging painfully against the confines of his skull.  
  
He had barely managed to prise himself from the floor when something hit his gut like a brick, folding him up with a muffled cry of agony. He crumpled in on himself, and caught a second blow in the forehead, snapping his head back so far that he felt his bones grinding.  
  
From somewhere, an unfamiliar voice said: “That’s enough. Let him up.”  
  
Easier said than done. Despite the danger, for several agonising minutes Castiel was only able to roll around on the floor. Any attempts to get his vessel up felt like trying to manipulate dead weight, and his borrowed body was watery-weak, slipping in and out of his command. In and out of _consciousness_ , he knew. It took him far too long to open his eyes, and even then one of his eyelids drooped slightly, throwing his vision off-kilter. More blood flowed freely down his face, drooling from his mouth.  
  
Somebody tutted. A male voice. “This is pathetic. I thought you guys were supposed to be warriors?”  
  
It was that more than anything which forced Castiel up. The world slipped and slid with every movement, taking a little longer each time to realign itself each time, but if he allowed it to settle back into focus he could see his attackers. He kept as much of a wary eye on them as he could, moving gingerly onto his knees. Standing would be beyond him, he knew; even settled on the floor, he was listing heavily to one side. Each breath came painfully, and he realized he was leaning to compensate for the pain in his ribs. One of his eyelids was beginning to swell.  
  
There were two people watching him: a pleasant-looking woman, and a surly teenager. The woman was neatly dressed as if for business, her hair sleek and perfectly styled in a complicated up-do. Not a stray thread or strand out of place. The teen was thin and pale, his face pockmarked with acne. He wore a long, black coat, and an unpleasant sneer; Castiel recognized him immediately as the one who had spoke before, and resolved to make him pay.  
  
Next to Castiel stood a heavily-built man with shoulders like the broad side of a house, and eyes as black as a shark’s.  
  
However, it wasn’t these people who caught Castiel’s attention so much as the fourth one.  
  
“Lucifer.”  
  
Lucifer smiled, and his vessel’s face cracked like blistered skin. “Castiel,” he said, with every appearance of friendliness. “It’s good to finally meet you again.”  
  
Without thinking, Castiel tried to take flight. The thought had barely even entered his head when the demon grabbed the back of his head and shoved him down onto the concrete, with enough force to bruise his throat and clip his chin. Castiel’s teeth snapped shut onto the end of his tongue.  
  
“Conduct your personal business on your _own_ time, please!” said the woman briskly, although her voice was pleasant in a way that Castiel could only call deliberate, like the foyer of a five-star hotel. “Let’s try and get through this as quickly and efficiently as possible, _shall_ we?”  
  
“Yeah,” said the teen, his voice reedy and unpleasant, hitting Castiel’s head like a dentist’s drill. “It’s not like we’ve got better things to do than stand here and listen to you fuck around.”  
  
Castiel half-expected Lucifer to pick up on the insolence, to destroy the child as they all knew he was capable of doing. Instead, Lucifer smiled thinly at the boy, in a way that suggested he would if he could. “Forgive me if I don’t count _World of Warcraft_ an important business engagement,” he said, in his terrible, soft voice.  
  
“I don’t even know why the fuck I’ve got to do this,” the teen considered, as if he hadn’t heard; or as if he were ignoring Lucifer which, if he wasn’t being pressed into the floor by his throat, would have made Castiel gasp. “I sent the fucking message, just like you asked. It’s not that I’ve got a problem with casual violence, but _I have shit to do today_.”  
  
“Quiet,” the woman snapped, her veneer of politeness cracking for a moment to reveal something not unlike a lion lashing out at a cub. However, when she next smiled the mask was back in place, and Castiel got the impression that she’d rather die than let it slip permanently.  
  
“Castiel,” she said warmly, as if she were greeting an old friend, or a loyal customer. “ _So_ good to see you at last. I _do_ apologize for the less than hospitable welcome, but we _had_ to be sure you wouldn’t fly away on us, you see.” She said this in a toneless manner, as if the words were carefully rehearsed and even more carefully delivered. “I know you’ve already met Lucifer here, but are you aware of who _we_ are?”  
  
Castiel made a garbled sound that may or may not have been _Television_. It occurred to him to try and fly again, but his body still felt like a pile of wet meat, as useless to him as an amputated limb. He was barely able to attempt it without the pain spiking in his temples and chest, his head spinning hard enough that he blacked out for a moment and floated on a sort of dark numbness.  
  
In his current position, his air-flow was cut off. He hardly had enough oxygen to stop the world fuzzing at the edges, let alone gather the last of his Grace and take flight.  
  
When he came to, the woman was still talking, whistling like a dial tone: “… our _esteemed_ colleague, Television. _My_ name is Media, and this is Internet.”  
  
“Oh god,” said Internet, theatrically, “get to the fucking point.”  
  
Media’s smile suddenly looked very strained, but she forced a high-pitched laugh, trilling like a bird. “Kids today, hm?” she shrugged ruefully. “Anyway, _as_ I was saying, we _do_ apologize for this, but it’s come to our attention that you’ve been asking questions, and I’m afraid we just can’t allow that. Of _course_ your chances of finding the man known as Shadow are _so_ slim, but I think you’ll agree that it’s not worth the risk for us, hm?”  
  
Castiel lashed out in desperation, and managed to catch the demon’s wrist in the fingers of his left palm. He summoned as much Grace as he could, his body screaming with the effort, and for a moment he really believed that he was going to be able to do it. He was going to banish this hellspawn and escape, barely scathed—  
  
The demon merely grabbed the back of Castiel’s collar in one of its shovel-sized hands, and threw him across the warehouse as easily as a rag-doll. The column made a dull metal sound as Castiel hit it, vibrating like a drum. Castiel caught the blow across his chest and felt his collarbone fracture.  
  
He crumpled to the floor and lay there. More blood flooded his mouth; he attempted to spit it out, and howled as the agony ripped across his chest. The floor resonated with his cry.  
  
“Now, now,” said Lucifer, like a disappointed parent, “there’s no need for that.”  
  
He made a cutting motion with his hand, and the noise abruptly died in Castiel’s throat, choked off as though by an invisible hand. He tried to draw breath and was terrified to find that he couldn’t. The panic hit him like a wrecking ball. Once, Castiel might have merely transcended the sensation; once, he might have been able to do that. Now, the loss of air came with the iron-cold grip of mortality, and to his shame, Castiel became a mindless, animal thing, scrabbling at the floor as if that could somehow draw breath into his burning lungs. His fingers split on the concrete, his nails catching and ripping, wearing right down to his bloody fingertips.  
  
His borrowed body was beginning to twitch and arch in ways that he didn’t command, its natural response taking over, drowning Castiel in one huge, suffocating wave.  
  
Lucifer looked down at him without pity, and Castiel found himself unable to look away from the cold detachment in the Devil’s eyes. He suffocated Castiel as if he were doing nothing more important than ordering a drink at a bar.  
  
Castiel’s vision was already beginning to dim when Media stepped up to Lucifer, smart as a soldier. Her outstretched hand was like a strange new form of salute. “I _trust_ you’re satisfied with the work we’ve done here today? Can we count on you remembering it in the future? I _would_ so _hate_ for our respective investments to go bad.”  
  
The disinterested glance Lucifer gave her made Castiel’s panic clutch harder at his throat. Even Media’s thousand-watt smile faltered a little at his dismissive, “of course.”  
  
Ignoring her, Lucifer knelt next to Castiel’s head, carding long fingers through his hair. As the air drained away from Castiel, so did his strength, his panic, and in his new state of calm, he marvelled at the way Lucifer could move so gracefully in such an ill-fitting vessel. He could see the Morningstar’s light where the seams of his skin were splitting, and it was cold, familiar, and so beautiful.  
  
“Shh, Castiel.” Lucifer gentled Castiel with his soft voice and kind touches, even as he strangled the life out of him. “I wish we could’ve ended this differently; I found myself almost liking you. For what it’s worth. But imagine what I could do with the technology of this world under my control. The tactical advantages it affords me are almost limitless.”  
  
Television’s voice. _One of my disciples is even laying in that bed behind you.  
_  
Lucifer smiled and thumbed the sudden creases from Castiel’s brow. “That’s the problem with our brothers, Castiel,” he said. “This world has moved on in the last two-thousand years, and they simply haven’t moved along with it. And in the end, that’s what’s going to kill them, not me. The Old Gods are replaced by the New. Always.”  
  
Castiel felt his body begin to spasm as death approached, snatching him up in its jaws without kindness or dignity. He thought of his mission, once a banner that he carried proudly, now lying in ruined tatters around him. He thought of Dean and Sam, whom he had failed, whom he would now leave to Hell on Earth. But the darkness would be a relief, he knew. He was ashamed to admit that he craved the surcease from fighting.  
  
But what lay beyond that… How would he be judged, for the life he had led?  
  
“Goodbye, Castiel.”  
  
Death dragged him under, and Castiel felt true fear for the first time.

 

* * *

 

Castiel woke up feeling hot and itchy in his vessel, the sunlight falling across his face.  
  
This last fact was enough to encourage him to move, and he squirmed away, bringing up a heavy hand to shield his eyes. The movement ignited a thousand little fires under his skin and a pressure in his chest like a lead weight; he whined high in his throat, wetness catching on the corners of his eyelids. For a moment it seemed as if his entire body was rebelling against him, and Castiel was caught between savouring the clean hurt and the shrugging off the pain like a second skin.  
  
It took a moment or two, but everything settled into more tolerable realms, leaving Castiel clinging to the edge of the mattress, his body drenched in sweat. The temperature in the room was easily a hundred degrees, and his sweat had dried like syrup. Castiel could feel where his hair was plastered to his skin like a coating of mud, where his shirt and shorts clung to every secret, delicate place of him. His tongue felt like a desert rock in his mouth.  
  
There was a bottle of water on the nightstand that had long since sweated its chill away. Still, Castiel suddenly found that he wanted nothing more. He grabbed the bottle and drank greedily until it was empty. That done, he set the empty container aside and took in his surroundings.  
  
He was in a bedroom, and for a second Castiel was sure he’d accidentally fallen back in time. He let his eyes trail across every item: the chest of drawers, the mirror misted with grease, the washstand and pitcher, even the Persian carpet spread across the floor, so threadbare that the pattern was wearing away to a block of drab colour. There was a single window, beyond which Castiel could see trees and blue sky. The bed beneath him was soft and inviting, the pillow thick and the sheets thin. The air was heavy with dust; white motes of it waltzed slowly in the shaft of sunlight.  
  
Castiel’s phone was sitting on the nightstand, alongside a single, white disc that he recognized, belatedly, as the chequer that Czernobog had given him, and Dean’s amulet. Castiel put that around his neck first, sick with the idea of losing it and sick with the way it eased his panic.  
  
He picked up his phone next and managed to turn it on, which precluded the possibility that he was in the past: usually his phone just refused to work. The date on the screen corroborated it – he was still there, in present day.  
  
He had three missed calls, all of them from Dean. But Castiel didn’t know how to access them. He closed the phone, and put it back on the nightstand.  
  
From the doorway, there was a soft creak.  
  
Castiel had a matter of moments to reach out to grab the lamp on the table, suddenly horribly aware of his own defencelessness, when he realized that it was just a cat.  
  
Then the door opened fully, and a man strode in as if he owned the place – which, Castiel reasoned, he probably did. He was tall enough that he had to stoop slightly, but not so much that he was in any danger of hitting the door. His features were fine and noble, and his nose wasn’t quite proportionate to the rest of his face.  
  
“You’re up,” the man said. As far as statements went, it was a redundant one.  
  
“Who are you?” Castiel asked; the lamp vibrated slightly in his hand, the cat let out a frightened hiss and bounded down the corridor. “Why am I here?”  
  
The man raised both eyebrows at Castiel, as if he was trying to convey something important that he felt that Castiel was missing. “You’re here because you were dead.”  
  
It came flooding back to Castiel then, like the scenes in one of Dean’s beloved movies: Lucifer, Media, Technology. The fake text message. _Dean_. Castiel felt the cruel grip of panic again: what if they’d got to Sam and Dean as well? How long had he been unconscious? More to the point, how had he even survived?  
  
“Somebody brought you here,” said the man, in response to the unspoken question. “That was four days ago, give or take. I have to say, you’ve made a miraculous recovery,” his tone was shrewd.  
  
“ _Who_ bought me here?”  
  
The man grinned, and suddenly Castiel wasn’t looking at a man, but a long-muzzled black dog, the kind that had been called a Kelb tal-Fenek when Castiel first walked the earth, but was now known erroneously as a Pharaoh Hound. The dog’s pink tongue lolled out of a long, toothy muzzle.  
  
“Fella by the name of Mr. Nancy,” he said. “Ring any bells?”

 

* * *

 

‘Here’ turned out to be a funeral parlour, or so the dog had explained over breakfast. Castiel had found his clothes folded neatly inside the dresser and put them on gratefully, as one might put on a suit of armour. He had glanced out of the window, trying to find some indication of where he was, and saw only a street of derelict houses with boarded-up windows. He assumed that the house he was in was of a similar style: tall and Gothic-looking, with a Southern-style porch. It looked like the only building on the block that wasn’t abandoned, and even then, Castiel counted at least four empty bedrooms on his floor. The stairs groaned as he descended them.  
  
Over breakfast, the dog-man introduced himself as Mr. Jacquel. He fried a pan of bacon and then ate his portion with quick snaps of his human jaws. “I don’t usually do this,” he had explained, as he transferred three or four rashers to Castiel’s plate, despite his protests. “My partner is a strict vegetarian, and usually I get all the meat I want at work. But when the cat is away, the mice will play.” He said this last part with a snort. When he was done, he went back and fried some more, but there was a stateliness about him that made it seem smart instead of greedy.  
  
“Mr. Nancy,” Castiel said, by way of conversation, “how did he find me?”  
  
Jacquel ate another slice of bacon, and then carefully licked a spot of grease from the corner of his mouth. “He’s Mr. Nancy,” he said, as if this explained everything.  
  
Castiel felt the slow simmer of irritation beginning to start. “What did he look like?”  
  
“Like Mr. Nancy,” said Jacquel. Something must’ve shown on Castiel’s face, because Jacquel quirked his mouth ruefully. “I’m sorry. Some Gods are notoriously bad about keeping to the same form. That’s why when we—” he stopped that line of thought quickly. “Anyway. That’s neither here nor there.” Jacquel chewed meditatively on another mouthful of bacon as he changed the subject. “So you’re the one they’re all talking about. The angel.”  
  
Castiel thought back over the events of the last few weeks. _Not for much longer, it seems._  
  
He was distracted by another man entering the room, moving with stilted, stork-like movements. The man looked down his nose at the plates of bacon – and it was a _very_ long nose. Longer than Jacquels, in fact, and pointing down slightly at the end, like a hook. He was wearing a pair of gold-rimmed spectacles, and now they caught the light and flashed, as if in anger. “Isn’t it a little late for breakfast?”  
  
Jacquel barked out a laugh, and snagged Castiel’s uneaten bacon whilst he was at it. “Angel, meet Mr. Ibis. Ibis, angel. He’s the one looking for Shadow.”  
  
Mr. Ibis regarded Castiel closely, but he merely said, “I see,” in an inscrutable voice. The little brown cat had crept into the kitchen behind him and was now sitting primly at his feet, fastidiously cleaning her paw and watching Castiel with one wary, amber eye. For his part, Castiel was holding Ibis’ serious gaze with a more challenging one of his own. For a long moment there was silence, broken only by the sound of the cat’s tongue and the chomp of Jacquel’s jaws.  
  
Ibis must have found what he was looking for in Castiel’s expression because he nodded almost imperceptibly and moved to sit down. “You were injured quite badly when you came here,” he said. “In addition to this, you haven’t been eating or resting properly – your body has been taxed almost to its limit. I feel it would be wise if you stayed for a few days to recover fully.”  
  
“Thank you, but I—”  
  
“Whatever it is, it can wait a few days, surely?” said Jacquel, in his deep, raspy voice.  
  
Castiel bristled. “I don’t think—”  
  
Ibis tilted his head to one side, in a manner that reminded Castiel of a bird sighting a worm wriggling in the dirt. “So you think you’re capable of fighting in this state? Of flying?” His tone wasn’t accusatory, merely curious.  
  
Just the thought of flying in his present state made Castiel feel dizzy. He could feel the buzz of blood beneath his skin, the ever-present exhaustion that kept trying to drag him down. His entire being felt weak, stretched too thinly; it had taken him five minutes to stand out of bed, and even then his body was a catalogue of bruises and breaks. He had to admit: no, he couldn’t fight, nor could he fly. He could barely _walk_. The thought stung more than he thought it would, and he inhaled a sharp, hurt breath.  
  
Castiel had never needed to eat before, nor had he needed to rest. But now perhaps it was time to – what was it that he kept hearing – _move with the times_. If that was the only way to defeat Lucifer, then so be it. Castiel couldn’t allow his ego to interfere with the equation; he was a soldier first and foremost: a tool, not an individual.  
  
“As long as I remain in one place, my brothers can find me.”  
  
“This is a house of the dead,” said Ibis. “Even if your brothers could, they wouldn’t be permitted to harm you here. You are familiar with the concept of Limbo, I assume?”  
  
“Limbo,” Castiel repeated, having stripped the word of inflection like a predator bird strips a carcass of meat. The sound of it sitting so heavily in his mouth made him shiver. Was this it? Was this Castiel’s _limbus patrum_? Or did Ibis simply mean it in the colloquial manner: was Castiel merely caught in a physical and existential stasis? Once upon a time Ibis’ meaning may have been clear, but time had re-shaped these false Gods like the wearing of tides, and now they moved and spoke in strange cadences, both mortal and magic. They had adapted, just like Lucifer. Castiel had not, and in doing so had broken the first tenet of war: _Know thy enemy._  
  
“I’ll stay,” he found himself saying. How sure he sounded! “For now.”  
  
He would stay with Jacquel and Ibis, in this Limbo; he would learn the ways of his enemies and emerge a specialized tool, built for their destruction. If losing himself was the only way that Castiel could find his Father, then he would take that leap of faith knowing that he was built to do so. He would learn to move with this world, and he _would not_ Fall.  
  
Wordlessly, Jacquel pushed the last piece of bacon across the table towards him. This time, Castiel accepted it without hesitation.

 

* * *

  
Castiel settled into a kind of routine, though he was loath to accept such an idea. Still, his days began to follow a sort of pattern. He usually awoke early, at least he roused from what passed for sleep for him. He found true slumber impossible, but quiet, meditative rest seemed to do his vessel and his Grace some good. He ate with Ibis and Jacquel, accepting whatever food they offered him (Jacquel seemed to find it amusing to offer Castiel new things to eat, in a way that reminded him hearteningly of Dean).  
  
Ibis and Jacquel went to work, and Castiel retreated to his room. The two men ran their business from one room of the grand old house, but Jacquel had waved off Castiel’s suggestion that he should help. “We can’t guarantee what’ll happen to you when you go out there,” he had said. “Everybody will follow the rules as they’ve been set down, but some’ll follow them more closely than others.” Sometimes he sat and watched Jacquel perform an autopsy, but he found Jacquel’s habit of eating the victims’ organs distasteful. More often than not he lay on his bed and read books. Ibis had an extensive library, and Castiel devoured it eagerly: everything from murder mysteries to dense historical textbooks, to short, palete-cleansing articles in the _Reader’s Digest_. He told himself that he was looking for something that could aid him in his mission, but his distinctions were broader than they used to be: every book was educational in one way or another and thus, every book was relevant. This was a new type of nourishment, and Castiel was gluttonous.  
  
After a while the little brown cat seemed to decide that he was no longer a threat to her, or perhaps she simply craved the company. Whatever the reason, she took to sitting on the windowsill, and though Castiel obligingly opened the window for her, she very rarely strayed out onto the balcony. Eventually he gave up waiting for her to show him what she wanted, and simply let her be.  
  
On the first night, Jacquel had suggested that Castiel check the voicemail on his phone, and had sneered when Castiel admitted to not knowing how. “Just like Horus used to be,” he had said, in a tone that carried both insult and fondness, but he had shown Castiel how to do it regardless and then conspicuously left the room. Castiel had listened to Dean’s voice there, in Ibis and Jacquel’s tiny, anachronistic kitchen. The first message had made Castiel smile: Dean, saying _we think we’ve got something_ and then pausing as Sam shouted in the background. _Shut up, bitch, I’m on the phone_! The laughter in his voice had warmed Castiel, and chased away the lingering chill.  
  
The next message had been more tense, Dean’s voice tight and controlled in a way that Castiel now recognized as the first choking grip of helpless panic. _Cas? I know you forget to call sometimes, but we just heard through the grapevine— never mind. Just call me, okay?_  
  
The last message had been the worst, and it still made Castiel uncomfortable to think about it.  
  
He called Dean as soon as it had finished, and didn’t even begrudge him for scolding Castiel like an errant child. It seemed that a demon in Memphis had been talking about him, to quote Dean, ‘ _like you’re already old news_ ’, and the message had made its way back to the Winchesters via Bobby Singer. When Dean had been unable to reach Castiel, he had panicked.  
  
“ _We even tried summoning you, dude_ ,” Dean had said, and the guiltlessness of his admission was either heartening or worrying, Castiel couldn’t decide which. “ _Where the hell did you go?_ ”  
  
“I’m safe, Dean,” Castiel had told him, and it wasn’t so much a lie as an optimistic version of the truth. “I was captured by one of my brothers, but I’m with friends now. I’ll be staying with them whilst they help me find my Father; call it a base of operations.” He told himself that this was a necessary evil, in order to allow Dean to continue on his mission unburdened by worry. Still, he couldn’t resist adding: “It seems Lucifer has made a number of… surprising alliances.”  
  
“ _Oh yeah?_ ” Dean had asked. “ _Define ‘suprising alliances’_.”  
  
Castiel thought back to Lucifer’s parting words. “I’m not sure,” he had said, “but I think you’d better keep me informed if anything strange happens to you.” Dean had scoffed down the line then, but Castiel remembered Television’s threat, and had said with more force: “Anything, Dean. Promise me.”  
  
Dean had promised but he hadn’t called since. Castiel hoped he never had reason to.  
  
In the evenings he went back down to the little kitchen for dinner, usually rice and boiled greens, which Ibis picked at like a bird. Jacquel sometimes gave himself and Castiel a slice or two of cured meat to go with it, and Castiel ate diligently, and carefully did not consider the jars of organs that he knew were stored in the refrigerator. Jacquel and Ibis talked and bantered over dinner in much the same way as the Winchesters, and Castiel found their easy companionship… relaxing. The few times they called on him to join the conversation he did so clumsily; theirs was a patois in which he was barely fluent in. Still, they made passable teachers and whilst it was a sting to Castiel’s pride to have them correct him, he persevered in the knowledge that every newly-learned fact was another tool in his arsenal.  
  
He took to calling Dean before he went to bed, and it was through these twilight calls that Dean managed to tease and guilt details of Castiel’s mission out of him. “ _Mr. Nancy, huh?_ ” He had said, but he sounded pleased. “ _I’ll get Bobby to take a look_ ”, he had said, despite Castiel’s attempts to dissuade him.  
  
“ _What, so this is a one-way street? Is that what you’re telling me?_ ” Dean had demanded, and Castiel hadn’t the heart to tell him that, yes, it was a one-sided relationship. How could he explain to Dean that it was necessary for Castiel to keep things from him without fracturing the fragile trust that had developed between them? He couldn’t. Castiel decided that sometimes discretion was the better part of valour, and let it go as gracefully as he could. He doubted that Bobby would find anything of use to him, anyway. This wasn’t so much a slight on Bobby’s skills as pride in Castiel’s own. But if Dean were to assume that Castiel hadn’t scoured every book and story he could, then who was Castiel to dissuade him?  
  
Worn down by the day’s events, Castiel would climb into bed and rest.  
  
The next morning, he would wake, and begin the whole cycle over again.

 

* * *

  
His bruises faded. His fractured bones knitted themselves back together, until he only felt a phantom ache when the clouds rolled in. Every morning he would stand in front of the fly-speckled bathroom mirror and catalogue the healing that had occurred during the night.  
  
Once, Castiel had resented his vessel, the way it bound him in bone and blood, skin and sinew too fragile for his purposes. Now, he was learning to take a kind of pride in it. It was a sturdy body, more durable than he had given it credit for. He just had to give it time.  
  
On the fourth day, restlessness began to gnaw at his bones. Castiel moved around the little house like a tempest waiting to break. His mission to find his Father was a fish-hook in his mouth, and he was powerless to resist its pull. He snapped at Jacquel and frightened the little brown cat so thoroughly that it refused to approach him even when he had calmed down, and become contrite. Even so, his bad mood signalled a wider shift: the sunny skies were gone, and the storm clouds were beginning to gather. The safety of the funeral home had been fine for a while, but now Castiel’s enchantment with the place was beginning to wear off, and the apocalypse loomed, ever-present in the background.  
  
On the fifth day, Castiel waited until Jacquel and Ibis were gone and then stepped out of the front door. The fresh air rushed to greet him like a long-lost lover, its cool hands cradling his face. Castiel breathed the sweetness deep. He walked down the path, the slabs split with wild-growing weeds, and then turned right onto the street.  
  
He didn’t notice the little cat, curled up in a sunny corner of the overgrown garden. She raised her head to watch him go, the only witness to his petty rebellion, and then went back to sleep.

 

* * *

  
Two blocks away, Castiel found a little restaurant and, because he could, and because he wanted to, he went in and found a seat. It was early, and the restaurant had yet to fill up, so Castiel took a window booth and gazed out at the street beyond. The television burbled merrily in the background, sometimes drowned out by the staticky sound of the grill. The smell of cooking fat was thick, and it made Castiel wish he had the money to buy a plate of hash browns, or a stack of bacon. He didn’t, though, and he didn’t so much mind: he held the desire like a stone in his chest, heavy and secret.  
  
It was shaping up to be a beautiful day. Castiel contemplated a walk in the park, in the sunshine – would he like that? He supposed it would be nice. He’d seen a river on his walk here, and suspected that it’d attract large crowds today, when it glinted in the sunlight like freshly-cut diamond.  
  
The waitress came over to take his order, of which he had none, and give him his coffee from the large pot she carried around with her. Castiel contemplated smiling at her, but in the end he simply settled for saying: “Good morning.”  
  
“Good morning,” she replied, so quickly that it had to be a Pavlovian response. She looked slightly harried, despite the fact that there was nobody in the restaurant, and Castiel found himself wanting to know why. When she spoke, her voice was brisk but strained, like she was just going through the motions. “Passing through? You’ve picked a fine day for it.”  
  
“Actually, I’m staying with some friends of mine,” said Castiel. “Mr. Jacquel and Mr. Ibis.”  
  
“Oh! Well, that’s nice. How are you enjoying Illinois so far?”  
  
“Fine, thank you,” said Castiel. Her pleasantries were starting to grate, and he found himself wishing she’d go away without really knowing how to ask her. Luckily, his silence spoke for itself, and the waitress wiped her hands on her apron and picked up her coffee pot again.  
  
“I’ll leave you in peace,” she said. “Give my regards to Misters Jacquel and Ibis, yeah?”  
  
“Of course. Thank you.”  
  
“You’re welcome. Holler if you need anything else.”  
  
She clipped away across the nearly-empty restaurant, and Castiel returned to his coffee. The mug fit perfectly in his curled hands, the warmth spreading out across his palms and the pads of his fingers. He soaked it in gratefully, even when it started to sting.  
  
The coffee smelt good, bitter and fragrant, and the scent of it stirred a thousand memories of sitting in similar establishments with Dean and Sam, but it was the warmth that was Castiel’s favourite part. It soothed his tense muscles and chased away the dark clouds that hung over him. When he was finally forced to pull his hands away his palms were raw and shiny, the skin scalded pink and puffy. Castiel had seen his fair share of wounds – had pulled Dean Winchester from Hell, after all – but somehow this part fascinated him. It was as if he’d shucked off his old skin and emerged as clean as a newborn into the sunlight.  
  
He had known Dean to do this, once, after a particularly bad hunt: stand in a shower so hot that it burned him. He’d never been able to understand why, and Dean’s explanation – _man, it feels good to be clean_ – had been an unsatisfactory half-truth. In his idle moments, Castiel had sometimes gone back to that memory, puzzling over it like a Rubik’s cube.  
  
He thought he understood now.  
  
A voice broke into his reverie. “ _Hey! Castiel!_ ”  
  
Castiel looked up to the television, where a man in sports padding was unbuckling a protective cage from his head. He threw it aside carelessly and leaned in close, until his whole face filled the screen, grinning in a way that showed off all of his missing teeth and left no doubt as to who Castiel was really looking at. “ _Remember me, sweetheart?_ ”  
  
Castiel glanced at the other patrons in the restaurant, but they didn’t seem to notice anything amiss. His waitress was reading a magazine behind the counter, and Castiel watched for a moment to see if she’d notice him. She didn’t.  
  
“ _Space cadet! Eyes up here!_ ”  
  
Castiel looked back to the television, where the goddess was scowling unattractively.  
  
“If I choose to walk out, right now,” said Castiel, “what would you do?”  
  
The picture changed to a scene of an old black-and-white gangster movie. The goddess was the gangster, or maybe the detective, lounging against the desk in suit and suspenders with her hat tilted down theatrically over her eyes. “ _See all these people? Think of them has hostages. Play by the rules, and nobody gets hurt. Except you, of course._ ”  
  
She flicked her hat back on her head and fixed Castiel with a dark glare.  
  
“ _Do you remember the last time we met? And I gave you some advice?_ ”  
  
“You told me to stop looking for Shadow,” Castiel supplied.  
  
“ _I believe my exact words were: ‘back off, and we won’t have to put you down’_.” The gangster’s lips moved, but it was the goddess’ voice coming out, and it took Castiel a moment to realize that she was using the voice of the scantily-clad woman she had first approached him as. The effect was… disconcerting. “ _And look what happened! Sometimes I wonder why I bother._ ” She sighed theatrically, but her eyes were narrowed in anger. “All I ever do is give people advice, and they never take it; something about it being inside the television, they think it doesn’t apply to them.”  
  
Castiel was tired of her games. “What do you want?”  
  
In answer, the goddess simply smiled and nodded at the window behind Castiel.  
  
Lucifer was standing out on the street, staring in at Castiel like a hungry wolf. Next to him stood Media, wearing a smart, summery dress and sunglasses with lenses as big as coasters. Her hair was collected into its usual neat bun, and she was looking not at Castiel but at the town of Cairo, her expression distasteful. Castiel stared into Lucifer’s fathomless eyes and felt a shiver begin to ripple along his spine. He felt the crunch as he crushed the mug in his palm, soaking his sleeve with still-warm coffee.  
  
“ _We warned you, Castiel,_ ” the goddess said. “ _That was a neat trick, hiding out with Jacquel and Ibis, you really had us fooled for a second there. No doubt they told you not to leave the house, hm? And yet here we are. You never were very good at following instruction, but it’s like I always say: an angel with a conscience is like a dame with a college education._ ” The goddess snapped her suspenders and then laughed happily. “ _Hey, this is kind of cool._ ”  
  
Castiel slid from the window booth and stood without taking his eyes off Lucifer. He was already evaluating his escape routes, which suddenly looked less-than-sturdy. He could try and run, but he didn’t know where the back exits were, if any, and Lucifer could conceivably have the building surrounded, or circle it before Castiel got out. He could fly, but Lucifer could follow him, and Castiel still wasn’t sure if his tolerance for angelic travel had recovered; if he became tired, then he was as good as dead. His only choice was to stand and fight, and even that seemed suicidal.  
  
His sleeve was dripping cold coffee steadily onto the polished floor, a steady tic tic tic like the only-slightly-less measured beat of Castiel’s heart. With a strange sense of detachment, he wondered if the waitress would be upset with him for making her clean it, if she’d grumble about him resentfully as she fetched the mop from the back.  
  
If he didn’t act quickly, spilt coffee was going to be the least of her troubles.  
  
Lucifer raised his hand, palm splayed towards the window, and Castiel _heard_ the world wrench around him, shrieking like it was in pain. The window of the restaurant fractured under the pressure, and Castiel watched the spidery lines dart lightning-quick across the pane, spreading like white frost. The ground rumbled beneath him, and for a moment Castiel imagined that he could feel something colossal and angry stirring in the core of the earth, roaring loud enough to shake the cheap plastic chairs across the floor.  
  
Between bouts of static, Castiel heard the goddess’ voice. “ _Word of advice? Run._ ”  
  
Electronics spat; the television exploded in a shower of sparks. The broken halves of Castiel’s coffee-cup jittered towards the edge of the table and fell, breaking into a thousand porcelain shards on the floor. Castiel was dimly aware of people screaming, plates shattering, the lightbulbs exploding in their sockets. He could no longer see Lucifer beyond the window, but the cracks kept spreading, and the world kept shaking, and he knew that his time for flight had long since passed—  
  
Castiel braced himself, and began to unfurl from his vessel.  
  
Behind him, he heard a familiar voice say: “Hey, now; let’s not be _hasty_.”  
  
A hand gripped his shoulder and _pulled_ , and then Castiel was cracking both knees sharply on the tiles of Ibis and Jacquel’s kitchen floor, landing palms-first with a solid _smack_. His ears rang in the sudden silence. It took long seconds until he was able to do anything other than cling to the tiles, dizzy and disoriented with the sensation of being dragged away from the thick of battle, and forced back into his skin.  
  
He’d been so close to revealing his true glory. So close…  
  
“That,” said the voice, from somewhere to Castiel’s left, “was without a doubt the _stupidest_ thing you’ve ever done, and I’m talking a _long_ line of incredibly stupid things.”  
  
Castiel rounded on Gabriel with a glare. “I didn’t ask for your help,” he snarled.  
  
“What, that’s all the thanks I get?” Gabriel asked, although he didn’t seem truly upset. “I just saved you from wiping out a diner full of people – you’re welcome, by the way – and that’s all you have to say to me? Well, fuck you very much, Castiel.”  
  
“I thought,” said Ibis slowly, like he expected Castiel to snap at him at any moment, “that we impressed upon you the dangers of leaving the house before you were healed.”  
  
“I _am_ healed,” said Castiel. He realized that this wasn’t a conversation he wanted to have from the floor, and picked himself up stiffly; it seemed that the enforced flight had aggravated his wounds. Castiel refused to consider the possibility that he wasn’t as healed as he thought, and turned on Gabriel instead. “You had no right to interfere. I’m more than capable of defending myself against Lucifer.” The anger that he’d been storing up for the fight tore through him like brushfire.  
  
“I beg to differ,” said Gabriel.  
  
“I’m as able a warrior as any of our brothers.”  
  
“Did I say you weren’t? I don’t think I said that. Jacquel, did you hear me say that?”  
  
Castiel spoke, and the little house shook. Ibis and Jacquel looked up as the tiles slid from the roof and broke like bombs on the garden path. From the old refrigerator there was a muffled jingle of glass as several of the jars containing dried organs shattered. One of the windows fractured with a loud ripping noise. The little brown cat leapt from the sill with a shriek and streaked out of the kitchen, leaving behind a cloud of loose fur that twisted like a tornado.  
  
In the silence that followed, Castiel stood there with his fists clenched and his chest heaving. It had felt good to purge that restless anger, to target it all on Gabriel like electricity going to earth, but now he felt bereft without it. The anger had warmed him, sustained him, and now Castiel was standing in the cold light of his own regret, suitably shamed and exhausted by his exertions.  
  
Without saying a word, Jacquel slid from his seat and opened the fridge. He swore loudly and creatively as something slid free and landed wetly, messily on the floor, spattering red gore up the cupboards and over his shoes. Castiel wasn’t sure if he felt triumphant or guilty: on the one hand, Ibis’ appropriation of the dead was sinful, borne from a doctrine incompatible with Castiel’s own. On the other hand, he couldn’t help but feel like he’d destroyed something sacred, and he felt the deep bite of regret.  
  
Ibis seemed to sense this: the look he fixed Castiel with over the rim of his glasses was stern, but not as stern as it could be. “Please don’t do that again.”  
  
Castiel looked away. Jacquel continued swearing under his breath, as he tried to salvage his worship.  
  
Gabriel looked between the three of them, and then threw up his hands and collapsed heavily into the chair so recently vacated by Jacquel. It groaned slightly under his enthusiasm. “Heaven help me, it’s contagious,” he said. “For the record? This is exactly like something that Dean Winchester would do. You’re getting impulsive, Castiel. Reckless.”  
  
_Human_ , was the unspoken accusation. _Weak_.  
  
“No more reckless than your decision to save me. Had Lucifer seen you—”  
  
Gabriel looked away. “Right place, right time. Don’t read too much into it.”  
  
“We wouldn’t even have known where you were,” said Ibis, “if it weren’t for Bast.”  
  
Castiel thought: _Bast?_ He followed Ibis and Gabriel’s gazes down to the floor, where the little brown cat was cleaning its paw with something like triumph. _Ah_ , he thought. **_Bast._** Strange, that he hadn’t seen her true nature vefore – no sooner had he thought this than he realized that even his perception of Gabriel’s Grace was gone. Ordinarily, Castiel was able to feel his brothers’ presence like the delicate plucking of the thread that connected them all as part of the same vast web.  
  
He had used to be able to hear his brothers’ cries from miles away, through the deepest recesses of Hell and the most remote regions of the universe, but that had ceased when he was resurrected. He assumed it was an oversight on his Father’s part. Perhaps, he had thought, it was deliberate: to allow him to concentrate fully on his mission.  
  
Now, he wasn’t so sure. What if he had already begun to Fall, even then?  
  
Castiel was contemplating this when his phone rang, filling the tiny kitchen with the somewhat overbearing strains of _Baby Got Back_ – Dean’s idea of a practical joke, of course. Everybody in the kitchen turned to stare at him and, although Castiel was beyond such human afflictions as mortification, it was a near-run thing not to feel embarrassed. He could feel his face prickle with the first onslaught of a blush.  
  
“I can’t change it,” he muttered, and beat a hasty, if somewhat undignified, retreat.  
  
It was Bobby, and that fact alone was enough to make Castiel apprehensive; he couldn’t see any reason why Bobby would be calling him, if not to impart some grave news about the Winchesters. Castiel was already considering how quickly and efficiently he could find Dean and Sam – he very pointedly did _not_ consider whether he could find them at all – when he answered the phone. “Bobby.”  
  
“ _Well, this is a turn up for the books_ ,” said Bobby, sounding tinny and far-away, and the accompanying burst of static made Castiel flinch. “ _Whenever I thought about having an angel on the line, I’ve got to say, this wasn’t quite what I imagined_.”  
  
Given the irreverent tone, Castiel felt it safe to assume that the Winchesters weren’t in any pressing danger. “Dean gave you my number,” he said. He had yet to master what Dean called ‘ _the act of small-talk_ ’, and felt awkward when he added: “… How are you?”  
  
“ _Still crippled_ ,” came the immediate reply. “ _How do you think I am?_ ”  
  
Castiel wondered idly if Bobby still blamed him for not being able to heal him, whether he still thought badly of him because of it. He had never told Bobby that Raphael was more than capable of restoring the use of his legs, because it seemed futile when Raphael would not consent to such a thing lightly. Whilst Castiel trusted Bobby more than he trusted Sam and Dean not to throw their lives away needlessly, Bobby was still human, and a hunter, and Castiel found those two things to be synonymous with self-sacrifice.  
  
“… _Anyway_ ,” said Bobby, at the end of a pause that Castiel recognized belatedly as being awkward. “ _Dean called me. Says you got yourself into a spot of bother._ ”  
  
“You could say that,” said Castiel. He almost didn’t elaborate – he had a feeling that Bobby would only report back to Dean – but felt compelled to add, in case Dean did ask: “I’m staying with friends right now. Messrs. Jacquel and Ibis. They’re taking good care of me.”  
  
There was a significant pause. “… _Jacquel and Ibis_.”  
  
Castiel frowned at the phone. “Yes, and?”  
  
“ _Jacquel and Ibis… as in Anubis and Hoth?_ ”  
  
“This is correct.”  
  
Another pause, and then Bobby exploded. “ _Boy, just how stupid are you?!_ ”  
  
“Excuse me?”  
  
“ _I get a call from Dean, telling me you’re searching for this Mr. Nancy with no luck – oh, Bobby, can’t you just help Cas out, please?_ ” Bobby’s imitation of Dean’s voice left a lot to be desired, Castiel thought. However, he had more pressing concerns: that shiver as if something had brushed past him in the gloom. A touch of the Fates; a brush with destiny. A shark, circling closer and closer. Castiel could feel the tell-tale tingle in his fingertips, like adrenaline, like possibility. Like something was about to _happen_.  
  
“ _Mr. Nancy,_ ” Bobby said slowly, as if he were afraid of Castiel not understanding him. “ _As in Anansi. You know, the trickster God? The one who’s been talked about in, oh, say, every civilization since the dawn of the time? I mean, you’ve heard of Loki, right? Puck? Set? Hell, it’s a long shot, but have you ever heard of Wisakedjak?_ ”  
  
Pause.  
  
“ _… Castiel?_ ”  
  
The line went dead.  


* * *

  
Castiel blew into the tiny kitchen like a thunderstorm. “ _You._ ”  
  
Gabriel looked up, his mouth already forming the oh-so-innocent reply – ‘ _me?!_ ’ – but Castiel could see it in his eyes, the knowledge that he’d been caught out. With that came the wariness: Castiel could see his brother readying himself for a fight, and found that he didn’t care. His rage was a white-hot thing, obliterating all sense and decorum. The house trembled with the force of his fury, and he was dimly aware of the cat running for cover, of Jacquel’s anguished yelp as he dived from his chair.  
  
“It was _you,_ ” Castiel snarled, and the windows shook with the force of his rage. “All this time, it was you—”  
  
“Castiel,” said Gabriel, in a tone of exaggerated calm; perhaps he had chosen _now_ to try and set a good influence. He half-stood, hands held up as if to ward off Castiel’s attack. “I can explain…”  
  
No. Castiel didn’t want to hear Gabriel’s explanation, his excuses as to why he’d deceived Castiel, waylaid him in his mission for weeks upon _weeks_. He acted on instinct, on emotion, and threw a punch. His fist connected with Gabriel’s jaw with a satisfying _whack_ and sent him crashing into the chair that he had just been sitting on, smashing it into a thousand splinters. _Good_ , Castiel thought, vindictively. He wanted this: to hurt, to destroy. To smash everything in this room to dust.  
  
Then Ibis was there between them, his arms spread out like wings and fury in his pale eyes. “ _Enough_!”  
  
Silence. Nobody dared move. Gabriel stayed on the floor, trying to staunch the flow from his bloodied mouth. Castiel glared at him, his chest heaving and his fists clenched so hard that his nails bit into the thin skin of his palms. He was already aching with the urge to throw another punch, to keep throwing punches until the beast inside him was sated. Ibis stayed where he was, as if daring either of them to try and defy him. Before, Castiel might have carried on regardless, confident in the knowledge that he could crush Ibis like a stalk of wheat. Now, he wasn’t so sure: was Ibis always that fearsome? That tall?  
  
For a long moment they simply stared at each other, caught in a tableau of chaos; Jacquel frozen mid-stride on his way to the fridge, looking trapped and frightened.  
  
“Now.” Ibis spoke into the tense silence like a razor scraping along a strop. To Castiel, he said, “This is a place of rest. If you can’t stomach our customs, at least do us the courtesy of respecting them.”  
  
Castiel held for a moment longer, because he knew that to give in would be painful. It was; his anger tempered by shame, turning inwards with the sharp teeth he’d turned on Gabriel a moment before. Human rage was different to Holy wrath; a rabid dog as opposed to a sleek hunting hound. Angelic fury was serviceable. Human rage was irrational. Now, with nowhere to vent, it began to snap at other targets, an animal restlessly caged.  
  
His capitulation was apparently good enough, because Ibis turned to Gabriel, who glared up at him fiercely from the floor, challenging him to comment.  
  
“You deserved that,” said Ibis, but his voice was only hard, not unkind. “Both of you, sit down. Mr. Jacquel, fetch Loki some ice for his face, if you’d be so kind.” There was an ugly bruise already beginning to shadow Gabriel’s cheek where Castiel had struck him.  
  
Gabriel picked himself off the floor more gingerly than Castiel felt was necessary, and dragged one of the unbroken chairs to the other side of the table. He didn’t take his eyes off Castiel as he did this, and part of Castiel crowed at the idea that Gabriel was wary of him. Wary of _him_ , a lowly _malakhim_! He felt suitably emboldened by the knowledge to follow Gabriel’s lead, and settled down opposite him.  
  
Ibis looked between them for a moment longer, before sitting down between them at the head of the table. Jacquel placed a frozen bag of peas in front of Gabriel without comment, and then retreated to his usual place. Castiel noticed that his expression was carefully neutral, and wondered if he was still upset about the loss of his offerings.  
  
The mutinous expression on his face suggested he wasn’t happy about it, but Gabriel grudgingly picked up the bag and held it to his face. Ibis folded his thin hands on the tabletop and looked between Gabriel and Castiel expectantly, and it occurred to Castiel that the heaviness in the air was familiar: he recognized it from Jacquel’s autopsies, where he so carefully sliced and stored and ate the organs of his cadavers. There was a sense of ritual to that and to this, too. Castiel was in the land of the Old Gods now, and he felt the magic stirring around him like an electric current running gently across his vessel’s skin. It felt like history, and like power. It felt… nice.  
  
He got the impression that Ibis was waiting for one of them to talk, but he still surprised himself when it was him. “Which are you: archangel or trickster?”  
  
Gabriel sighed visibly, like explaining this was a great hardship, and Castiel bristled at the implications. Ibis looked to him immediately, and his gaze was a warning that Castiel felt compelled to heed. _Wait your turn, Castiel. Let him speak._  
  
“I’m not the first trickster,” began Gabriel. “The Loki that the Vikings worshipped? Or the one that tried to destroy the Old Gods? Yeah, that wasn’t me. But in a way, I sort of _am_ that Loki. Likewise, I’m not the Set that Ibis and Jacquel knew, but then I _am_ …” Gabriel took a good look at Castiel’s face and stopped. He ran one hand through his hair in a gesture of frustration that was startlingly human. “Look, Gods aren’t strictly people; they’re more like… ideas. Or concepts. You ever wonder how Czernobog ended up over here? It’s because the people who believed in him came over here, and brought the concept of him with them. In the old days, not so much any more, there used to be a Loki in every country, and it was like… it was like Belgian chocolate. Everybody has the recipe, but American chocolate made with a Belgian recipe still tastes like American chocolate.”  
  
He stopped again, and looked briefly wistful. Castiel realized that this was the first time he’d seen the shine of Gabriel’s silver tongue tarnished, and watched with a sense of fascination.  
  
“Tricksters aren’t born or created,” said Gabriel. “We sort of make ourselves, and we’re the worst ones for sticking to our posts. I was an angel before I was a trickster, but now? Who knows.” He shrugged, as if his problematic, muddied identity was of no concern to him. Castiel, who had dug his claws into his identity and clung on even when it began to slip away from him, fought the urge to visibly recoil.  
  
“Oh, don’t look at me like that—” Gabriel started, but Ibis made a soft, negating sound, and he stopped. His expression suggested he wasn’t happy about it, but he stopped.  
  
Castiel assumed that this meant it was his turn to speak. “You saved me from Lucifer. Before. Why?”  
  
“I’m still your brother,” said Gabriel, simply. Some of Castiel’s incredulity must have shown on his face, because he added, “I didn’t say I was a _good_ brother.”  
  
“You know a lost cause when you see one,” Castiel repeated Wisakedjak’s words like an accusation, and was only slightly put out when Gabriel didn’t flinch. Instead, his expression darkened, storm-clouds brewing on his face. With the bruise that Castiel had put there, Gabriel looked like he’d been brawling: a wild and terrible warrior-god.  
  
“I may have been playing a part then, but what I said was true. Shadow isn’t going to have any answers, whatever anybody thinks. It’s still a fool’s errand.”  
  
“But you know where Shadow is.”  
  
For a moment Castiel didn’t think that Gabriel was going to tell him, that he was going to lie, that he was going to run away. The room was so quiet that Castiel could hear them all breathing in symphony, all hanging on this one moment, this one question—  
  
Eventually, Gabriel spoke. “Say, _hypothetically_ , I’m willing to give you an in…”  
  
Castiel stood and ignored Ibis’ command for him to sit down. “Gabriel.”  
  
“What the hell are you hoping to find, Castiel?” Gabriel asked, responding to Castiel’s irritation in kind. “Whatever they’ve told you is Chinese whispers, nothing more. You want the truth about our Father? Then take it from somebody who knows: he doesn’t care. He doesn’t care, and he doesn’t want to be found.”  
  
“I have faith.”  
  
This time, Gabriel _did_ flinch. “I’m not sure if you’ve noticed, but we’re at war out there. And you’re… what? What are you doing, Castiel? This mission of yours is… hope and rumours. Nothing more. You’re just sneaking around, following up leads. What kind of soldier are you?”  
  
Castiel knew that he was being goaded, but he still felt the sting of Gabriel’s words down deep. His rage turned outwards again, and this time it had teeth. “I don’t expect you to understand,” he said. “You ran away from your garrison, and hid under the mantle of a false god. What would you know of this battle?”  
  
Gabriel stood, and Castiel sprang to his feet, as the table lurched forwards and jabbed into his belly. There was a fury in Gabriel’s eyes like the hot, bitter tang of blood in the heat of battle, and Castiel felt his own lip curling back from his teeth, both of them snarling like animals.  
  
Ibis stood, bellowing at them to sit down, but they ignored him.  
  
“I gave up everything for this!” Castiel shouted over the top of the din. “I _died_ for this!”  
  
“Oh, cry me a river. Better yet, how about you use the wood from that cross you’re on, build a bridge, and get over it?”  
  
“I turned my back on the Host in order to search for our Father and now I’m hunted by them, day and night. I’m losing more of my Grace every day I continue on this path—”  
  
“All the more reason to _choose a new path_!”  
  
“Don’t you understand, _there is nothing else for me now_.”     
  
Silence, so deep that Castiel could hear the soft tinkle of glass in the refrigerator. For the first time since Castiel had known him, Gabriel seemed lost for words – shocked by Castiel’s declaration or the force of it, he couldn’t tell. “You really think that?” he asked softly.  
  
Exhaustion crept up on Castiel like an unchivalrous enemy, and he suddenly recognized how tired he was. There was something pounding at his vessel’s temples that could have been a headache, and for a moment he let it drag him down, weighing his limbs like wet feathers.  
  
“I’m losing my Grace,” he repeated. “My ability to fly, my ability to… banish demons.”  
  
“That still doesn’t exactly make you useless, bro,” Gabriel rubbed his jaw as he spoke, looking rueful.  
  
“My purpose has always been to serve Heaven. If I can no longer do what I was created for, then I can no longer call myself an angel. I’ll be something else.” _I’ll be you_ , he thought, although not maliciously. He wasn’t sure he could walk the path Gabriel chose, however; he could redefine himself to an extent, but to completely change what he was? The idea terrified him. He could no more give up being an angel than Dean could give up being human.  
  
“If Shadow can’t lead you to your Dad,” Jacquel said, “what then?”  
  
“Then I keep searching,” said Castiel, as easy as anything.  
  
“And what if he’s dead?” Gabriel asked. His expression was hooded. “What if he says ‘no’? What if you can’t go any further, and this is it?”  
  
This answer took more thought than the last, but only a little: “Then I fight, for as long as I’m able.”  
  
Something in Gabriel’s expression suggested he wasn’t satisfied with that answer, and for a moment Castiel braced himself in anticipation of another argument, an onslaught as devastating as a tidal wave. Instead, Gabriel sighed and stood. “Alright, _fine_ ,” he said, like Castiel was a child and Gabriel was capitulating to taking him to the park, to buying him ice-cream, to something small and silly and not something that influenced Castiel’s entire being. “But don’t say I didn’t warn you. And when Shadow tells you that he can’t help you, which he will, because he’s Shadow, then don’t come crying to me.”  
  
“I’m an angel of the Lord,” said Castiel, a little testily. “I don’t cry.”  
  
Gabriel rolled his eyes expressively. “Come on, then. I don’t have all day, and neither do you.”  
  
Castiel stood, but before he could approach Gabriel, Jacquel came and clapped one broad hand on his shoulder. _Ah, of course_ , Castiel thought. _Farewells_.  
  
“I’d say you’re welcome to come and stay next time,” said Jacquel, “but frankly I’d be happy if I never saw you again. _Either_ of you,” he added, with a significant look at Gabriel.  
  
“You wouldn’t catch me dead here,” said Gabriel archly.  
  
“Exactly.” Jacquel grinned like a wolf. “See you around, Gabriel.”  
  
“Will you be safe from Lucifer?” Ibis asked.  
  
“ _Please_ ,” Gabriel rolled his shoulders like a man getting ready for an Olympic race. “Give me a little credit. Lucifer might be good, but he’s not as good as me, nowhere near it. Besides, he can’t go where we’re going. Them’s the rules.”  
  
Castiel approached Gabriel with more than a little trepidation. “Where are we going?”  
  
Gabriel wrapped a hand around Castiel’s shoulder and grinned. “Indiana.”     
  
Then it was as if a hook had lodged itself in Castiel’s belt buckle and suddenly _yanked_. Gabriel whooped happily, and it reminded Castiel of the noise Dean Winchester made when he was driving at eighty-five miles per hour down a straight, flat desert road. _Makes you feel alive, huh, Cas_?  
  
With no other option, Castiel shut his eyes and submitted to Gabriel’s pull.

 

* * *

  
“Drink?”  
  
“No, thank you.”  
  
Castiel stood in the middle of the sumptuous lounge, looking around politely and feeling out-of-place, the way he always did in other people’s homes. There was an empty whiskey tumbler on the coffee table, and now Shadow snagged it between three fingers and took it to the bar, refilling it from a bottle rather than a decanter, which surprised Castiel for reasons he couldn’t quite place. The television he had seen earlier was playing an old gameshow – the answer was _armadillo_ – and he watched it warily for any signs of the goddess. There was a photo on the mantle of a man – obviously Shadow – and a woman, their laughing faces filling up the entire frame. Castiel tried not to stare too hard at it, recalling Gabriel’s words: _He was married, but his wife died._  
  
“I hear you’ve been looking for me,” said Shadow, like some people would say _I hear you’ve got a new car_ or _I hear it’s warm in Spain right now_. He had a very strange way of speaking, Castiel noted, almost as if he weren’t used to the luxury of it. He came back with his tumbler of whiskey, and gestured towards the couch. “Sit.”  
  
Castiel sat, and leaned his wrists on his knees, curling his whole body forward protectively. He watched Shadow take a gulp from the tumbler and set it aside.  
  
“What did Czernobog tell you about me?”  
  
“That you could help me. Why?”  
  
In answer, Shadow held up his hands, one after the other, showing them both to be empty. Castiel watched in bemusement, unsure of exactly what Shadow was trying to show him. With something that might have been a smile on another face, Shadow scrunched his hand into a fist, and then opened it like a flower.  
  
In the center of his palm lay Dean Winchester’s amulet, coiled in a nest of black cord.  
  
Castiel reached up to his neck in a panic, and grasped for the reassuringly jagged shape of the amulet. It wasn’t there, of course; it was in Shadow’s hand. Still, Castiel couldn’t understand _how_ , which was why he reacted with fear, with anger. He was already half-rising out of his seat, nothing in his mind except retrieving the amulet, by force if he had to.  
  
“ _Give it back_ ,” he demanded, and the picture on the television screen dissolved into a blizzard of static.  
  
Far from being intimidated, Shadow simply shrugged and tossed the amulet at him. Castiel caught it and clenched it so tightly in his hand that the horns bruised his skin. His heart was beating in his chest, and he could feel it in the tips of his fingers, like a marching song. But Shadow didn’t attack, merely rested his elbows on his knees and watched Castiel, his gaze heavy and assessing. It took a conscious effort to will himself to relax, to sink back into the chair, and even then he perched like he was afraid it would attack him.  
  
“What are you?” Castiel asked.  
  
“I’m a god,” said Shadow, as easily if he were telling Castiel his age or his place of birth. “Or so they tell me. I think I used to be a regular guy, but I don’t know. As far as some people are concerned, I was always Baldur. But I was born Shadow, and I grew up as Shadow, and I think I’d rather be Shadow than Baldur.”  
  
_Gods aren’t born_ , Gabriel’s voice repeated in Castiel’s memories. _They’re created_. Created by other people, by their stories and beliefs, and then somebody or something came along to fill that role, and that’s how they became a god. The idea was repulsive, blasphemous to boot, and Castiel shied away from it; if it were true, then his Father was as false as the rest of these Old Gods, and Castiel’s faith in him was misplaced.  
  
“Is it?” Shadow asked. “People put faith in all sorts of stupid shit, all the time. Doesn’t make their faith any less valid. If you sacrifice enough to something, then you give it power. That’s how all Gods come into being.”  
  
“My Father,” began Castiel, hoping against hope for something, _anything_ …  
  
“I don’t know the answer to that,” said Shadow, dashing Castiel’s hope without even having the grace to look guilty about it. “Sorry. I met him once, and I’ve been staying away from him ever since. The last I heard he was dead.”  
  
Castiel did something he’d never done before then: he leaned forward and put his head into his hands, and exhaled a long, fractured breath. With it, he exhaled all the frustration, all the exhaustion, all the broken, jagged, cluttered feelings inside of him. It didn’t help. He just felt… empty. The amulet was a dead weight in his hand, reminding Castiel of his failure. His father was dead, and with him their hope of ending the apocalypse without suffering. Now that task fell to Dean and Sam, and Castiel cringed at the thought of the pain and misery they would have to endure to do so. What of Bobby and Chuck? Neither of them could fight this battle, should it come to them. Castiel couldn’t hope to be of help. He could fight, but he was no protection against the Host, and he _would_ die.  
  
He had bet everything – _everything_! – on this mission, and he had lost it all.  
  
When he looked back up, Shadow was watching the television, where a woman was trying to convince viewers to buy a carpet cleaning kit. Shadow’s expression suggested he wasn’t going to be one of those viewers.  
  
With extreme care, Castiel clipped Dean’s amulet back around his neck, fumbling a little with the tiny clasp. He tucked it carefully beneath his shirt, and its warm weight felt strange even after such a short time without it.  
  
By the time he’d finished, Shadow was looking at him again. “You look like shit,” he observed.  
  
“It doesn’t matter,” Castiel said. “I failed in my mission. My Father is dead.”  
  
“Not really,” said Shadow. “Somebody once said that this is a bad land for Gods, but I guess it all depends on which Gods you’re talking about. Some of them are still going strong. The New Gods, mostly. But eight-hundred million people believe in Kali, and if she gets buried in an earthquake or swept away by a flood, they’re not going to stop sacrificing their time to her. That’s a lot of power, and somebody’s gotta be around to benefit from it.” Shadow shrugged then, and finished the rest of his whiskey. “It sounds stupid, but sometimes all it takes to bring an Old God back to life is the right kind of faith.”  
  
Hope kindled in Castiel’s chest, flickering in the ashes of his faith. “A sacrifice?”  
  
“Maybe. Maybe not.” Shadow shrugged. “That’s what I mean about ‘the right kind of faith’. The Old Gods, a lot of them feed on blood sacrifice, but killing yourself is a hell of a gesture to make if it doesn’t work.”  
  
“I’m not afraid to die,” said Castiel, and he was surprised to find that he meant it.  
  
Shadow’s gaze was weighty, but it gave away nothing. “You don’t know any better.”  
  
Castiel thought back to the last time he died, and recalled light and pain and then… nothing. Darkness, in which sharp-toothed things swam. Castiel had died like a soldier, straight-backed and unafraid, and been reborn with the knowledge of how foolish such a gesture had been. How naïve, to think that he had nothing to fear from oblivion!  
  
He tilted his chin a little and said, “I know how it feels to die for my convictions.”  
  
“Well,” said Shadow. “That changes everything.”  
  
He stood and went over to the bar, aiming once more for the bottle of whiskey. Shadow drank in a way that reminded Castiel of Dean Winchester, as if that simple action kept the weight of the world from settling on their shoulders.  
  
“It used to be easy,” said Shadow. “Gods fed on the blood of their followers, that was the rule. Now, time is the most precious thing people have to sacrifice.” Shadow’s expression darkened in a way that suggested he was thinking of something unpleasant. “The Gods have new languages now.”  
  
_I know_ , Castiel wanted to say. _I’ve heard them speak_.  
  
There, in Shadow’s house, Castiel felt that shiver of foreshadowing again. He felt the stir of something passing so close to him in the dark that he could almost taste it—  
  
“What you’ve got to ask yourself,” said Shadow, as if from very far away, “is what would your God want?”  
  
\-- without warning, Fate turned and _bit_.  
  
Just like that, it had him. Just like that, Castiel _knew_.  
  
When they were created, angels were beings of faith as well as warriors, and every enemy they slew was slain in unquestioning loyalty to His name. This was the purest definition of Faith: committing the sin and trusting that the Father would forgive them. In time, this was how humans worshipped. They fornicated, they fought, and all in His name, trusting that they would be shown mercy. This, Castiel knew, was how his father was born: the sacrifice they made to him was their righteousness, in the hope that the ends justified the means. That their child justified their fornication. That their claiming of unholy lands justified the bloodshed they had caused.  
  
Castiel could have faith, because that was what he was created for. He would betray brother and friend alike, because he had strength in his convictions, because he had faith that they were also his Father’s convictions. His sacrifice would be his Grace, willingly given in the hope that – what was it? That you couldn’t make an omelette without breaking a few eggs. He would risk the Fall, would risk being torn asunder by his brothers, would risk demon and angel alike because he had faith that he was carrying out God’s work. Because he had faith that his Father _would_ return.  
  
This would be Castiel’s Test, and he _would_ be rewarded. He knew, because he had faith.  
  
The new sense of purpose buzzed through Castiel’s borrowed body, singing through his Grace like a hallelujah chorus, and he stood. He had no more business here: he had work to do.  
  
“Do me a favour,” said Shadow. “If you see Easter again, tell her I’m not picking up any more causes until I’ve paid off my mortgage.” He said this not unkindly, but matter-of-factly and besides, Castiel wasn’t offended. “You can let yourself out; I’ve got work in the morning.”  
  
Castiel made to leave, but Shadow’s voice stopped him in the doorway.  
  
“You know, when I bought this house, I thought I could live here,” he said, sounding wistful. “Do some fishing on the lake, maybe meet a girl. But I can’t. That’s the thing about changing – it’s difficult to go back again.”  
  
Castiel felt compelled to ask. “And does that please you?”  
  
Shadow looked over and smiled. He looked terribly sad all of a sudden; sad, and older beyond his years. Like Dean Winchester, Shadow looked like a man who had been through Hell and back. “Nah,” he said, “but you take the lot you’re given, I guess.”  
  
Shadow turned back to the television, and then added, “and if you see that good-for-nothing trickster, tell him that Shiva’s on the goddamn warpath again.”  
  
Castiel let himself out. He had barely made it off the front step when his cellphone rang.  
  
It was Sam. “ _Hey, Cas_.”  
  
“Sam,” said Castiel, surprised. It was rare for Sam to call him. “What’s wrong? Is Dean…”  
  
“ _Dean’s fine. He’s… he’s out, actually. He met somebody in the bar earlier, went home with them_.” Sam didn’t sound exactly thrilled about this fact, but like he was willing to accept it as part of Dean’s recovery. Castiel made a mental note to address that later; it wasn’t that he begrudged Dean his vices, it was that they were often indicative of a deeper weakness of character. “ _Listen, I’m still following up the Song of Songs lead—_ ”  
  
It hit Castiel like a sledgehammer, what Gabriel had been trying to get him to recognize. Egypt. The _Shir ha-Shirim_. It was a long shot, a collection of coincidences, but if Castiel was right…  
  
“Sam, this woman; did Dean approach her?”  
  
“ _Actually_ ,” said Sam slowly, clearly unsure as to why Castiel was asking, “ _she came over to him; picked him out of the entire bar. You can imagine how happy Dean was about that. Why?_ ”  
  
Castiel clenched the phone so hard that the plastic creaked and broke in a shower of sparks. In the next moment, he was standing in Sam and Dean’s motel room, dropping chunks of plastic and electronics onto the carpet. Sam looked up in surprise from where he was sat at the hotel table, bent over his laptop, and the white-blue light of it illuminated his wide eyes, the soft, shocked shape of his mouth. “Cas?”  
  
Castiel ignored him and strode towards the noticeboard. The map had a handful of new pins in it, and all of them were staying away from that space in the middle as if repelled by an invisible force.  
  
“We need to find Dean.”  
  
“What? Why?” Sam was on his feet in seconds. “Cas, what’s going on?”  
  
“There are some scholars who believe that the _Shir ha-Shirim_ was written about a Queen who ruled over the kingdom of Sheba in the 10th Century. She was supposed to be the consort of the King Solomon.” As he spoke, Castiel was scouring the map, trying to spot something, _anything_ , to lead him to Dean, for he was suddenly sure that Dean had been taken by this creature.  
  
“You’re kidding me,” said Sam incredulously. “The Queen of Sheba, seriously?”  
  
“Before, I remembered a story my brothers told me. A Fatimid caliph who disappeared without a trace in the hills of his own empire, and was never again seen on Earth or Beyond. I knew the setting was important, but I didn’t make the connection until now.” Castiel could feel that faint, shivery panic again, but he forced it down, and allowed himself to feel only calm. Even so, his voice broke slightly as he spoke, energy rising and cresting inside him in one long, electric wave. ”Bilquis isn’t just a myth, Sam; the angels have been aware of her for years. But I never imagined she’d come here…”  
  
Castiel trailed off as he heard it.  
  
Dean. Crying out, as if in pain or panic, the howl of a snared animal. The symbols on Dean’s ribs prevented Castiel from seeing Dean’s location, and for a moment he cursed his lack of foresight, which would have had Dean die, hidden from Castiel’s view. But Dean and Castiel were connected in a way that even the Enochian couldn’t fully sever, only muffle: after all, Castiel had held Dean’s soul as he pulled him from hell. Now Castiel could hear Dean’s voice, distant but strong, a beacon to guide him across the city.  
  
Without another word, Castiel took flight in pursuit of it.  
  
Part of him knew he should feel guilty for leaving Sam behind, but Castiel’s warrior instincts were in full flow, and he knew that he didn’t have time to waste pandering to Sam’s sensibilities. He had one task now, and that was to protect Dean Winchester.  
  
He followed the sound, blind and trusting it to lead him to where Dean was.  
  
Barely two seconds after he disappeared from under Sam’s nose in a dirty motel room, Castiel reappeared in the eye of the storm: in the bedroom of a sixth-story apartment, right in the middle of that spot where the push-pins refused to go.  
  
“Cas!”  
  
Dean was lying on the bed, naked and glistening in the strange, red light, like a creature under an infra-red lamp. There was a woman sitting astride him, arching obscenely as if in pleasure, her dark hair tumbling down the sinuous line of her back. She half-turned to look at Castiel as he appeared, and her eyes were also dark, smouldering with heat. Castiel could feel the power of her tangibly, stroking his skin like lover’s hands. The air was thick with incense smoke, and Castiel felt sweat spring up along his hairline, his vessel suddenly choking, claustrophobic.  
  
She had already taken Dean up to the waist, and now he was slowly getting dragged into the cleft between her legs. His hands were white-knuckled on the pillow, and he seemed to be caught between euphoria and panic. Bilquis rocked slightly, and Dean yelped as he slid another half-inch inside her. It reminded Castiel, bizarrely, of watching a snake swallow its prey; there was something distended about her legs, her belly.  
  
“Hello,” she said, in a predatory purr. “Have you come to join in?”  
  
Castiel stepped forward and raised his hand, but he was mindful not to let too much of his true form slip free. “ _You will release him_ ,” he said, and the windows rattled slightly in their frame as if they were laughing at him.  
  
“Oh, honey. What do you think I’m doing?” she laughed. “He wants it, don’t you sweetie?”  
  
Dean made an inarticulate sound and threw his head back on the pillow, as if in exquisite pleasure-pain. That would explain the magic Castiel could taste in the air, then; this was a form of worship, and he knew that Dean was only barely cognisant of what was going on. It was nothing short of a miracle that he’d even had the wherewithal to scream. Had he not, Castiel would never have found him, and he would have died like those other men: disappeared without a trace.  
  
“Dean,” said Castiel, and his voice was like a battering ram, smashing against the hold that Bilquis had on Dean’s mind. “Close your eyes. Don’t open them until I say.”  
  
Dean made a drawn-out sound that might have been Castiel’s name, judging from the number of vowels in it, and Castiel couldn’t tell whether or not he was pleading with him to stop Bilquis or let her continue. With a slick sound, he slid another inch or two forwards, up to his waist. The look Bilquis gave Castiel was triumphant, and the ancient, primal thing inside him roared with fury.  
  
“ _Close your eyes_ , Dean!”  
  
Castiel only waited to see Dean scrunch his eyes close, and he couldn’t tarry any longer to see if it was permanent. He unleashed as much of his Grace as the small room could handle, and his wings striped the walls, the shadows nightmarish against the red light. The walls shook under the force of his fury, and the lamp exploded in a shower of sparks, plunging the room briefly into deeper shadows.  
  
Lit by Castiel’s grace, Bilquis was an ugly, catlike creature with a row of teeth like needles, which she bared at Castiel now as she hissed. The notches of her spine showed clearly through her skin; she must be starving, Castiel thought. Her hands, which were once delicate and feminine, tools of pleasure and persuasion, were now thin and cruelly clawed.  
  
“ _Mal'akh Elohim_ …” she growled, in her terrible, guttural voice, making the word filthy and hateful. There was no emotion in her milky-white eyes. “ _Leave me to my meal_ …”  
  
“ _Succuba_ ,” Castiel intoned, and then called upon her by name: “Balqis. You _will_ release him.”  
  
“ _You would disturb my temple_ ,” she accused. As she spoke, Castiel could hear the wet, slipping sound of Dean disappearing further into her belly. “ _This man has given himself to me willingly, and his sacrifice will sustain me. My blood is wearing thin, and I must feed._ ”  
  
“Not on him,” said Castiel, and strode forwards.  
  
Bilquis screamed and shrieked, struck at him again and again with hands like whips of thorns, tearing great chunks out of his wings, but Castiel grit his teeth and reached for her. He closed his hand around her throat and _wrenched_ , and she let out a great yowl of anger as Dean slid free of her with a sound like he had been wrenched from the mud. Then Castiel was lifting Bilquis free, and she squirmed and span and spat in his grip, kicking like a wild animal, with all four limbs.  
  
Castiel threw her with all his might, and she crashed through the wall of the bedroom and tumbled through the living room, overturning chairs and smashing ornaments as she went. She sprang to her feet nimbly, though, and ran at him, streaking through the gloom like a shadow herself, so fast that he could barely follow her.  
  
She hit him by surprise, and Castiel fell backwards with a cry as she pounced, and dug all five claws deep into his chest. He fell on something wet and alive, and thought _Dean_ even as the man twisted and scrabbled out from beneath him.  
  
He pulled his Grace back in on instinct, and the room darkened around them.  
  
“ _If you will not allow me my sacrifice, then I will take it by force_ ,” hissed Bilquis. She shoved him back against the bed, and her legs wrapped around Castiel’s hips like iron bands. “ _Even weak as you are, your Grace could keep me alive for centuries—_ ”  
  
There was a _thud_ , followed by another in rapid succession, and Bilquis slumped on Castiel as if her strings had suddenly been cut. Castiel tensed and hissed as the movement aggravated the wounds in his chest, but Bilquis simply lay there; she was still breathing, but she was unmoving.  
  
Castiel shoved her off him roughly, and she flopped onto the bed in an untidy sprawl.  
  
Dean was standing next to them, naked as the day he was born and picked out in soft, glistening relief by the moonlight. His chest heaved, each quick, wheezing breath audible in the silence that followed. The lamp that Castiel had exploded was clutched in his hand, the scarf hanging from it like a bloodstain. He looked like he was thirty seconds from full-blown hysteria.  
  
“What the hell _is_ that thing?!”  
  
Castiel reached over and calmly, with a gentleness that belied his intent, snapped the creature Bilquis’ neck. The sound was obscenely loud in the silence, and Dean’s breath caught in his throat.  
  
“Bilquis,” said Castiel. “She was a succubus who masqueraded as a minor goddess; in her day, my brothers knew her as the Queen of Sheba. We lost track of her somewhere in the fifteenth century, and I failed to make the connection when you asked me to help with your case. I’m sorry.” Castiel stood carefully, and flinched as five thin rivulets of blood ran down his chest. “You should get dressed. We need to leave.”  
  
Dean went into Bilquis’ bathroom to clean himself up, looking rather dazed, and Castiel could almost see his brain parsing and compartmentalising the events that had happened. Castiel stayed outside, and stripped the bed down efficiently, wrapping Bilquis’ cooling corpse up in the sheets. She looked… old, he thought. Old and hungry. Castiel felt no sympathy for Bilquis, but it made him consider Shadow and Czernobog, and for a moment he empathized with them, facing down the probability of their own mortality, their own slow, wasting decline.  
  
On impulse, Castiel picked up a little stone statue from the foot of the bed. In the gloom, he could hardly see what it was: a human figure, he thought, running his thumb over it. A female figure.  
  
Dean came out of the bathroom looking more like his old self, and Castiel quickly slipped the statue into his pocket. He watched in respectful silence as Dean stared at the neat little bundle of bedsheets, eventually saying, “If she’d… you know, eaten me, would I have come back this time?”  
  
“I don’t know,” said Castiel. “I don’t know what happens to sacrifices to other gods.”  
  
“But you said she was just pretending to be a goddess.”  
  
“She was. But that didn’t make her power any less real.” Dean looked confused then, so Castiel attempted to explain. “If enough people believe that Bilquis is a goddess, then that is what she becomes; a false goddess, but a goddess nonetheless. She was not born but created, out of faith and sacrifice.”  
  
Dean pulled a face. “We burning that?” he asked, pointing at the bundle.  
  
“I’ll deal with it,” said Castiel. At Dean’s raised eyebrow, he elaborated: “Burning her nearby would be risky. I will take her back to her land of origin, and burn her there.” He wasn’t sure why he said that: he certainly hadn’t intended to return her home, as it were. But it felt right, all of a sudden, to do so, and when Castiel hefted the bundle in his arms, he did it with more respect than he ordinarily might have.  
  
Judging by the look Dean gave him, it was as odd to him as it was to Castiel.  
  
“You should go back to the motel,” said Castiel, although he suspected Dean would do it anyway. “Sam’s worried about you. And I advise you to leave this city tonight. There will be no more deaths by Bilquis’ hand.” He felt reasonably sure of that, at least, but Shadow’s words still came back to haunt him: _Sometimes all it takes to bring an Old God back to life is the right kind of faith._  
  
“Yeah, thanks,” said Dean, in a tone that plainly said he was being sarcastic. Castiel didn’t take it personally: Dean was feeling embarrassed, and his shame made him prickly and guarded. He stayed to watch as pulled out his phone, but the body in Castiel’s arms was as heavy as stone, weighing him down with its purpose.  
  
The last thing Castiel heard before he took fight was Dean’s voice.  
  
“ _Hey, Sammy? You’re not going to believe this, but—_ ”

 

* * *

 

Czernobog was watching television when Castiel walked into the front room, Zorya Vechernyaya following close behind with disapproval in her every movement. Still, she had allowed Castiel entry, however grudgingly; he suspected the promise he’d made to Czernobog had a lot to do with that. He was dressed the same as Castiel saw him last time, but he looked different, somehow. Castiel thought it was because he looked happier, more vital and less like the tired old man he had before. The arrival of summer had done wonders for him, and for the tiny apartment; it had been scrubbed clean of grime and soot, the windows polished until the sun was able to shine through them, and the crumbs vacuumed from the carpet. The air that filtered in through the window was cool and clean.  
  
Czernobog smiled when he saw Castiel. “You have come to play checkers with me?”  
  
“Not yet,” said Castiel, resisting the urge to smile.  
  
“Ah. You have a new mission,” Czernobog said with a dismissive wave of his hand. His eyes, however, were sparkling with mirth. “I see it in you; you are a soldier again, yes? So we can wait for that game, I think.” Movement in the corner of the room caught Castiel’s attention, and he looked up as Zorya Utrennyaya appeared in the doorway.  
  
Castiel dug in his pocket, where the little stone statue bumped against his fingers, and brought out the checker that Czernobog had given him the first time they met. “I came to return this to you,” he said, as he placed the checker piece down on the little coffee table with a click. “I apologize for the delay.”  
  
Czernobog picked the piece up carefully with his thick, stubby fingers. It looked small in his hand. “Ah, good,” he said, with deep satisfaction. “Now I can play again. Is no good, trying to play without one piece. Both sides must start out with same advantage, otherwise the game cannot be fair.” He placed the checker on the board gently, with apparent satisfaction.  
  
His job done, Castiel turned to go; it would be almost lunchtime in the Honduras, and Easter was waiting. He had made a promise, after all. Zorya Vechernyaya watched him from the kitchen with an expression that said he’d already been there five minutes too long.  
      
As he let himself out, Zorya Utrennyaya asked: “Did you find him?”  
  
Castiel stopped and half-turned to look at her, offering the smallest of smiles. His second sight was all but gone now, but Castiel could still wistfully remember Zorya Utrennyaya in his mind’s eye, young and fierce and beautiful. He might never get to look on her that way again, but Castiel didn’t regret it. _You take the lot you’re given, I guess._  
  
“No,” he said. “But I still have faith.”

 

* * *

 

 

 

**end.**

 


End file.
